


Taking Advice from Cookies and Riding in Cars with Idiots

by Small_Fe



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Dirty Talk, Explicit Language, First Time, J2, M/M, Roleplaying Character, non-au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-20
Updated: 2014-07-01
Packaged: 2018-01-09 10:15:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 47,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1144777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Small_Fe/pseuds/Small_Fe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You work together, live together, and even when you have time to yourselves, you look for opportunities spend it with each other. And now you're only concerned because you think you might be in love with him? I think you should be concerned it took you this long to figure it out."</p><p>Set during filming of Season 3 but with flashbacks to earlier times in the series. </p><p>Written as a fill to this prompt on the SPN kink meme: http://spnkink-meme.livejournal.com/78801.html?thread=28672209#t28672209</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. They Didn’t Shoot M*A*S*H in Vancouver

**Author's Note:**

> This is a mostly Non-AU story with the obvious exception that it depicts a romantic relationship between the boys. 
> 
> While it's obvious from the prompt that their RL wives don't end up with the boys in this story, I LOVE their wives and this story is written for people who LOVE their wives so just know that the women are treated with love and respect in this story (the way I hope we as a fandom always treat them), and are written to be the way I imagine they actually are in real life: genuinely cool and likable people.

Jensen walks into Jared’s – well, _his_ – house and is greeted the second the door closes behind him by three overly enthusiastic bodies bounding loudly up to him to greet him.  Harley and Sadie beat Jared – both in timing and excitement – but just barely. 

“Hey man! Welcome home!” Jared grabs Jensen and pulls him into a hug once Jensen stands up from where he had squatted down to hug and greet the dogs.

“Dude, I saw you like two hours ago,” Jensen laughs but hugs back while Jared looks slightly embarrassed by his enthusiasm. 

“I know! But it’s like – we’re roommates now! It’s…I don’t know…ceremonial right?” 

“Got it. Well, if you’re done with the ceremony? I need to grab the rest of my stuff.” 

“Dude, _we’re_ moving your stuff?” Jared looks incredulous and Jensen smiles at Jared’s unquestioned assumption that if Jensen hadn’t hired movers, they _both_ would have had to spend the evening lugging furniture. And while he would whine about a lost night out, it wouldn’t occur to him to try to get out of helping.

But that was just Jared. It was the same impulse that was responsible for Jensen moving in with Jared after all. 

A month ago Jensen had flopped down next to Jared in the hair and make-up trailer and declared, “well, I’m homeless.” 

Jared looked over curiously, earning a smack from Jeannie who was doing his hair at the time. “What’s up?” Jared asked after he readjusted his hair and gave Jeannie a teasing glare in the mirror. 

“Tom’s selling his place. I have to move.” 

“Fuck, Jen, I’m sorry,” Jared had said seriously. “What are you gonna do?” 

“Well I have _no time_ to look for a place, so I’m just going to do a hotel for a few weeks until the holidays or hiatus, whichever comes first.” Jensen shrugged and shook his head, thinking about how the looming writer’s strike put everything in such a tenuous situation. 

“Jensen, man, it’s August. You’re gonna live in a hotel for, what? Over three months? That’s stupid. I have a spare room. Come live with me.”

Jensen blinked and looked up. Jensen had become used to the fact that Jared shared none of his caution when it came to people, preferring instead to dive into friendships with seemingly boundless affection. But this was a step beyond because their separate apartments had become basically the last thing that stopped them from – as Eric had so lovingly put it once – “just needing to wear one big shirt.” 

Jared stared at him in the mirror. “Come on. We’re together all the time anyway.” 

“Exactly. Isn’t that an argument against living together?  Jesus, I mean, aren’t you even remotely afraid you’ll get sick of me?” 

Jared squinted in confusion for half a second before answering simply. “Nope.”

Friendship was effortless to Jared like that. Even when they first met. Jensen felt immediately at ease with his co-star from their very first lunch together, but Jensen is more hesitant by nature so it was Jared that escalated things past the point of what would have been a genuinely friendly working relationship to the deep friendship Jensen was now surprised to admit how much he needed. 

Jared was a force of nature, and he had made it so easy. Looking back on it, Jensen sometimes felt as if Jared’s friendship had been something that had been done _to_ him. All of a sudden, he had been best friended. 

Goofing around in between takes became eating together everyday when the director called lunch. Lunch on set morphed into heading into town for lunch and thinly-veiled excuses for why they “accidentally” took the Impala off set. Lunches became dinners out and getting together to watch football games on Jensen’s couch because he had a better television. Makeshift tailgate parties that gave them an excuse to start drinking at noon and not stop until late, seasoning steaks with Texas dry rubs, arguing over the best mix of spices, and throwing them on the grill on the balcony, pulling them off only once they were covered in deep char marks but still light pink inside. 

Gradually, hanging out together became the only reliable thing about their otherwise haphazard schedules. Whatever time would allow, they would do. Long shooting days – and they seemed to always be long shooting days – meant retreating to one trailer to “run lines,” which tended to devolve into playing PlayStation or strumming guitars. Often they would plan to hang out “for just awhile” before separating to sneak in a quick nap between takes. After the first time they fell asleep together on Jared’s couch, sitting next to each other, feet up on the small coffee table, breathing deeply, Jensen awoke with a start. He was ready to take a ribbing for not having left and gone to his own trailer, but the teasing never came. Instead Jared had just given a small clap on his back and expressed relief that neither of them snore. After that, neither of them even offered to leave each other’s trailers for naps, opting instead to simply sleep when they were tired and allowing the other to do the same or not, an easy comfort bred from familiarity and a quickly forming co-dependence. 

Weekends were their time off, but they found themselves choosing to be together even when they didn’t have to be. They both lived in LA and would travel down together, mixing their social circles with ease until it had morphed into a tight group of guys they both considered “buddies of ours” without distinction about who had known whom first. 

When shooting ended early enough, or on the weekends that they decided not to travel, they made a habit of finding hole-in-the-wall bars where they might not be recognized. Those nights always ended with drinks until late, sitting up and closing down Vancouver dive bars, nursing beers on nights when they had to get up in the morning and “losing track of how many scotches this makes” on the nights they didn’t. 

Smiling into their drinks long after the ice melted and mellowed the taste while they talked until last call about everything: Gossip on past co-stars, dream roles, girls, families – nothing was off limits. It was during one of these nights a few months into shooting the first season that Jared found out Jensen wanted to direct and Jensen found out that Jared had once almost gotten in a fight with Scott Patterson and that he had once made out with Lauren Graham. 

It was one of those nights that Jensen had first talked about his father Jared. When he described their relationship – his admiration for his father and his desire to be more successful than he was as an actor, which arose not out of competition but a genuine desire to impress him and to prove to him that he had passed on the best of himself to Jensen – Jared listened rapt. When Jensen shrugged sheepishly as he often did when he feared he’d shared too much, Jared had grinned and asked to meet him. Jensen didn’t think he was serious, but Jared wouldn’t drop it. That was why, the first weekend after shooting had wrapped for the season, when it wasn’t even clear if they’d be back for a second season, Jensen and Jared flew down to Texas together. Instead of separating at the airport, they went together, first to Jared’s family home and then Jensen’s. 

Jared grew up in San Antonio, but his family had since relocated right outside of Dallas, so the drive was reasonable. They saw each other’s brothers (who they had both already met on visits to Vancouver) and met each other’s sisters. They addressed mothers as “ma’am” and teased old high school photos. But when Jared met Jensen’s father, the hug he gave him and the mix of respect and enthusiasm with which he interacted with him floored Jensen. Jared was on his “interview behavior.” He was charming and engaged and Jensen was struck by the fact that he was trying hard – and succeeding – to impress his father. 

When Alan insisted Jared drop the “Mr. Ackles” and call him by his first name, Jared had shaken his head shyly and offered, “how about Papa Ackles?” Alan had roared his laughter and nodded his assent while the three of them stood on the patio drinking beer out of chilled pint glasses. Jared listened to Alan’s stories intently, asking questions, grinning happily, and it occurred to Jensen that Jared wanted to get along with his father because _he knew it would matter to Jensen that he did_. That touched Jensen in a way he couldn’t quite put into words, so instead of trying, he had clapped Jared hard on the back and told his father he didn’t need to worry because Jensen was “with family up in Vancouver.” Alan had agreed that indeed he was. 

Their friendship had just happened without Jensen really needing to try, which was something new for Jensen. He had been lucky to meet some incredible people in life – and his relationship with his family was great – but he always felt like he was, and needed to be, the caretaker in his relationships. As a result, he wasn’t used to someone giving as much as Jared gave. Even after two and a half years, he was still amazed by it. 

Jensen shakes himself from his daze and grinned at Jared. “No, I hired movers and they’re coming tomorrow afternoon, but I have a couple bags in the car.” 

“OK, well hurry up. We’re gonna be late.” Jared walks past Jensen into the kitchen. 

“We’re not gonna be late. We’re not meeting Tom and everybody until, like, 10.” 

“Yeah, but we gotta have drinks first. Many, many drinks.” Jared holds up two beers, opening one on the counter and handing it to Jensen. 

“Leave it to you to want to pre-game _drinking at a bar_.” Jensen shakes his head laughing but takes the beer. 

“Hell yeah, we’re pre-gaming! Two days off, Jen. Two. And it’s not even the weekend! We don’t have to be back on set until Thursday. Drink the fuck up!” Jared gives a hearty laugh as Jensen walks back outside. 

Two beers, two generous shots of scotch apiece, and a healthy buzz later, Jensen and Jared pour out of a car, wave to the driver (not Cliff, who is off duty) and head to a small bar with a sign out front that reads “The Still.” 

“You know they named this place for M*A*S*H?” Jensen tells Jared. “It’s named after – you know how Alan Alda’s character had that still? That’s where they got the name. ‘Cause they filmed that show up here.” 

Jared is nodding until the last sentence and he looks quizzically at Jensen. “They didn’t shoot M*A*S*H up here.” 

“Yeah they did. “ 

“No they didn’t.” 

“Yeah they did. How do you think this place got its name?” 

“Dude you can’t use the thing you’re trying to prove as proof of the thing you’re trying to prove.” 

“That made no sense.” 

“No, your thing made no sense.” 

“You remember the show right? Alda’s character had a still!”

“I’m not arguing with the fact that he had a still I’m saying – ” Their argument is interrupted when they get to the back of the bar and spot their table. Tom, Chad, and Christian greet them happily, if a little tipsy, and pull up chairs. 

Jensen waves to a waitress and immediately addresses the group. “Wasn’t M*A*S*H filmed up here?” 

Christian runs a hand through his hair. “The T.V. show?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Yeah,” Chad agrees. “You know I heard that’s where this place got its name.”

Jensen sends a smug smirk Jared’s way as the waitress walks up. “Hey there,” he grins up at her. “We’ll have two McCallen’s on the rocks – doubles – and whatever you have on tap. “ He gestures to himself and Jared and hands her a card. Jared smiles at the waitress and nods an unspoken “thank you” to Jensen.

“I told you,” Jensen declares once the ordering was done. 

“That only proves he heard the same wrong rumor as you.” 

“Then how did this place get its name?” 

“Jen, you do realize that the word “still” is not irrevocably associated with M*A*S*H, right?” 

The drinks arrive and Jensen immediately hands Jared a beer, a shot, and grabs a spoon. As if its second nature, he spoons out half of the ice in his glass and plops it into Jared’s. The rest of the table stares in awe as they lock eyes, mutter “salud” to each other, clink glasses and take a swig of scotch. They each pick up their beers after and notice the table is looking at them. 

“I like more ice,” Jared stammers by way of explanation and is interrupted by laughing. 

Chad shakes his head. “Are you two fucking? You know it’d be cool with us if you were?” He looks serious for a moment and gives a small smile. “I mean, we’re dicks, but we’re not assholes, you know?” 

“Fuck you,” Jensen returns amiably and drinks some more of his scotch. 

Tom chimes in. “You do spend an _awful_ lot of time together. And now you’re living together? We just want you to know you can tell us.” 

Jensen rolls his eyes. “And I just want you to know you can bite me. You spend a lot of time with Rosenbaum. Are you two fucking?” 

Tom snorts out a laugh and downs his drink in response. Jensen smirks and turns to Chad. “What about you, Chad? You ever fuck James?” 

“I would have fucked James,” Chad laughs. “He’s hot.” 

“Plus he was the only one on set you didn’t fuck, right?” 

Chad flips Jensen off and continues talking. “Speaking of, a couple of the girls are coming tonight.” 

“Who?” Christian asks immediately. 

“Danneel and Elisabeth.” Christian nods and Chad continues. “Danneel asked about you, Jensen.” 

Jensen looks up surprised. He and Danneel have known each other casually for a bit, but they are by no means close. 

“Asked what?” 

“Asked, _asked_.” Chad raises his eyebrows. “You’re single right? If we don’t count Jared?” 

It’s Jared’s turn to flip Chad off, but he casts his eyes down for a moment and Jensen notices he has finished most of his scotch. Jensen grimaces almost imperceptibly thinking about how broken up Jared was only two weeks earlier about his break-up with Sandy. He has recovered mostly, which makes Jensen suspicious. A week of wallowing where Jensen spent most nights at Jared’s place, enjoying the silence between them until Jared fell asleep. Jared never really gave him details, just that no one cheated and it they’re on good terms. He seems fine now, but Jensen wonders if this conversation is bringing up some of that stuff for him. 

“I’m single, yeah. But I expected a boy’s night tonight!” He claps Jared on the knee and raises his glass. He downs the rest of his shot and signals the waitress for another round.  “Besides, I thought she was dating what’s-his-name?” 

Chad shrugs and Christian chimes in. “No, they broke up awhile ago, man.” 

Jensen looks at Chad. “You didn’t know that? You’re trying to set me up with her, and you don’t even know if she single?” 

Chad looks affronted. “What am I supposed to do? Ask if she’s single?” 

Jensen looks baffled. “Yes!” he bellows as the table erupts into laughter. 

“Whatever, she just barely likes me at this point.” 

Tom rolls his eyes. “Well you fucked over her friend. What do you expect?” 

Chad holds up his hands in surrender. “I know, I know.” 

Tom shakes his head. “See, this is why you’re being stalked by the girl you met last month. Bad karma.” 

“It’s not karma, it’s a stalker.” 

“You have a stalker because of your karma.” 

“I have a stalker because she’s crazy! How are you trying to make this my fault?” 

“Ooh! I want to play. I can make anything Chad’s fault in like three moves.” Danneel walks up with Elisabeth in tow. “Hey guys.” 

Jensen looks up and smiles. He and Jared both immediately stand and offer their chairs. Danneel sits down and turns to Chad. “What’s your fault?” 

“Nothing,” Chad pouts. “The fact that I have a stalker is not my fault.” 

“Did you sleep with her?” Danneel asks immediately. Chad is quiet. 

Jared looks up. “Did you and Kenzie break up?” Chad scrubs his hand over his eyes and shakes his head and Jared just laughs. “You’re an asshole, Chad.” Jared tells him. 

“I am,” Chad agrees with a sigh and finishes his drink. 

“See?” Tom throws up his hands. “Karma!” 

“You don’t have bad karma,” Danneel begins and then after a beat amends. “Well, you do. But that’s not what this is. You also don’t have a stalker. You have an ex-girlfriend, basically. You want her to stop calling you? Stop sleeping with her.” Danneel looks up at Jensen laughing and stands. 

“We need a bigger table,” she announces and heads off to talk to the waitress. After a moment, she waves the group over and they follow her outside to a patio where several larger tables are. The cold air has left this area mostly empty except for a smaller group at another table and a few brave stragglers at the bar. But when the waitress turns on the heat lamps everyone agrees it’s comfortable enough to give up the cramped indoor table for more space and the warmth of the heat lamps. 

The group continues to drink and talk and drink well into the night until the table service ends, forcing them to have to get subsequent rounds directly from the bar. 

At one end of the table, Tom eyes Jensen and Danneel talking and nudges Chad to look over. Chad huffs out a laugh. “Yeah, but now Jensen just has to close. “ 

“He’ll close,” Tom insists. “Jensen’s a good guy. Good guy. Good karma.” 

Jared rolls his eyes at that even though he doesn’t know what he’s disagreeing with. He finds himself becoming annoyed with Tom, which seems to his alcohol-muddled brain as both unfair and perfectly reasonable. 

 _What does Tom know about karma?_ Jared thinks. _He’s Superman. What the fuck kind of karma gets your home planet blown up?_   

He pushes down this flare of _something_ – a feeling he can’t quite place – and plasters a smile on his face.  He likes Danneel. He always has. And he actually thinks she and Jensen would be good together. He shrugs off the uneasy feeling as disappointment that their first night as roommates is being interrupted, and turns back toward his drink. Realizing it’s empty, and not feeling like walking to the bar, he reaches over to Jensen while continuing to laugh at something Tom has just said, and taps Jensen’s wrist. Without turning away from Danneel, Jensen hands Jared the rest of his drink, which Jared takes and downs. 

Danneel grins. “It’s cute how close you two are.” 

Jensen blinks in surprise, barely registering that he had interacted with Jared at all until he thinks about it. “Yeah, we’re adorable.” Jensen pulls Danneel up and walks them to the bar to get another round for the table. 

Danneel thinks for a moment and then lowers her voice. “You know, Elisabeth is single too if you think Jared –” 

Jensen shakes his head. “He and Sandy _just_ broke up. He’s not really ready –“ 

“Oh, sure. Of course. I just thought –“ 

“No, I – thanks. It was a nice offer.” 

“It’s nice. You take such good care of him.” 

“He’s my best – he’s my best friend.” Jensen gazes over and Jared for a minute and Danneel looks at him curiously as if she’s slowly figuring out a puzzle.  She helps him carry, sets the drinks down, and then turns to Jensen with a smile. 

“Yeah, well, I think we’re gonna head out.” Off his surprised look she continues. “We’re intruding on boys’ night, and that’s really not my style.” She grabs her purse and drops some cash on the table. He tries to hand it back to her but she stands firm. “If you want to, call me. You can buy me a drink the next time.” 

“I will,” Jensen promises. Danneel grabs Elisabeth who waves hastily and they leave. As soon as the women are out of earshot, the table erupts into teasing. 

“What the hell?” Chad asks. “Why didn’t you go for it?” 

Jensen shakes his head. “Tonight was boys’ night!” 

“Boys’ night doesn’t mean you have to go home alone,” Christian answers earning a protective glare from Jared as he throws an arm around Jensen. 

“He’s not going home alone,” Jared laughs. Jensen relaxes back into Jared’s arm, which stays there until they leave the bar. 

Jensen and Jared get home late that night – or early the next morning – and are confronted with something that should have occurred to them much earlier. 

Jensen doesn’t have a bed. 

Jensen glances at the couch and shrugs as Jared apologizes. “We shoulda thought this through.” 

“Nah, it’s cool, man, I can sleep on the couch. 

“Jensen, that thing isn’t comfortable. The night Sandy and I broke up, I offered her the bed and went to sleep on the couch. I couldn’t do it. I waited until she was asleep, snuck out and got a hotel room,” Jared begins laughing at the memory and is egged on by Jensen’s laughing back. 

“You left your own house and got a hotel room?” Jensen roars. “You have a guest room, idiot!”  

“With no bed in it, idiot. Obviously, otherwise you could just sleep there now.” Jared pushes Jensen playfully and lets his hand brush his back lightly. 

Jensen considers this and is forced to shrug in agreement. “What did Sandy say when she woke up?” 

“I snuck back in super early.” Jared starts laughing again and Jensen shakes his head. 

“You’re a class act, Padalecki.” Jensen beams at him. “Seriously. That was very gentlemanly of you. She woulda felt guilty if she knew you couldn’t sleep on the couch and she should get the bed. You’re a good guy.” 

“I can always tell when you’re drunk ‘cause you get all super earnest.” 

“Well, I can always tell when you’re drunk because you say ‘super’ like every other word.” 

“I say that when I’m sober.” 

“You say it more when you’re drunk.” Jensen nods sagely as though he is dispensing actual wisdom. 

“Come on upstairs, Jen. We can share my bed.” Jensen shoots Jared a look and Jared rolls his eyes. “Dude, you can’t sleep here,” he gestures to the couch. “It’s one night, come on.” 

Jensen follows Jared upstairs. They peel off their shirts and undershirts and then look at each other expectantly about pants. Jared grabs two pairs of sweat pants and throws one to Jensen. Jensen grumbles about them being too long, but pulls them on and climbs into bed. They are both quiet, the alcohol mixing with fatigue to bring sleep about quickly. 

“You could have crashed at my place. “ Jensen says suddenly awake. 

Jared rolls over and looks at him blearily. “What?” 

“Instead of getting a hotel. You could have just come to my house. Why didn’t you do that.” 

Jared shrugs, but rolls back over on his back and stares at the ceiling. “Because then I’d have to tell you we broke up. And that would have made it real. Telling you things is what makes them real. And I wasn’t ready for that to be real yet.” 

If it hadn’t been so heartbreaking, it would have been the nicest thing anyone had ever said to Jensen. 

They are quiet again, but this time, Jared breaks the silence. “She’s hot.” 

“Sandy?” 

“Danneel.” 

“She is,” Jensen agrees readily. 

“And not just that. Like, she’s hot, but everybody’s hot. She’s cool, too, you know?” 

“She is all the temperatures,” Jensen says with a smile. 

“Then why didn’t you close?” 

“Oh don’t you start too.” Jensen admonishes him. “I have her number. I can call her.” 

“You should.” Jared sounds serious so Jensen rolls over to look at him.  “I want you to call her. I don’t want it to be like – you don’t have to ignore women because I just broke up with Sandy. That was never what I wanted.” 

Jensen looks confused. “I know.” 

Jared looks over seriously. “OK?” 

Jensen huffs out a small laugh. “OK.”

They fall into silence again, and this time, no one speaks, and they both drift off to sleep.


	2. I Always Wanted to Go There

One weekend while filming early in second season, Jared and Jensen had both the worst and the best ideas they had ever had together. They had decided not to travel to LA and instead to stay in town and go out. The worst idea came Friday night. It was called the “Supernatural Slushee” – a weird, red, blended drink the hot bartender had created in their honor. She didn’t tell them what was in it, and after the third one they stopped asking. 

The next morning had been brutal. They called each other the next afternoon when they finally pulled themselves out of bed, each trying to convince the other one to come over to ride out their hangovers together. 

“My T.V.’s bigger,” Jensen had reasoned. 

“My hangover’s bigger,” Jared had countered. 

“Dude, come on. We’ll watch whatever you want.” 

“Please, Jen?” Jared had begged with a pout that was practically audible over the phone. Jared had won and they both knew it. Whenever Jared begged in that voice, Jensen caved. Jared called it “playing the little brother card.” Jensen called it cheating. Whatever it was, Jensen couldn’t say no. He showed up at Jared’s house twenty minutes later. 

They flipped through channels and finally settled on _Blazing Saddles_ , which was just starting and Jared couldn’t remember if he had ever actually seen it. Jensen had declared that sacrilege, grabbed them two Gatorades from the fridge and settled in. 

Ninety-five awesome minutes later, they were transfixed. It turns out, Blazing Saddles is the perfect hangover movie. Smart but not complicated, deep but easy to follow. Hilarious – even sober – and just the right mix of action, plot, and drama. 

“Nowhere special? I always wanted to go there,” Jensen murmured along the last line with Gene Wilder. 

“Damn,” Jared breathed. “That was incredible.”

“Right?” Jensen had agreed happily. “Best idea ever.”

That weekend became a barometer for them. From then on, bad ideas were compared to Supernatural Slushees and good ideas were compared to Blazing Saddles. 

That’s why when Jensen turns to Jared while he’s tuning his guitar, as they sit on the couch late one night after filming and says, “Living together might be our best idea since Blazing Saddles,” Jared gives a huge smile and pushes him playfully. 

“Right? Best idea ever.”

They’ve been living together for about a month and neither of them can remember how they functioned before. Everything just makes _sense_ now.  

They had always ridden to work together, and now they get picked up together, too. It used to be that on the rare occasions when one of them wrapped before the other, they had both always felt guilty about getting to go home and have an actual evening when the other had to work. Now when they wrap at different times, whoever gets out first goes home and starts (or orders) dinner. They don’t have to debate whose house to hang out at when massive fatigue or hangovers take over weekend mornings. Instead, they slide out to their living room and sit in companionable silence until they have the energy to start their day. 

On the nights when they have more time, they stay up late without worrying about building in time for someone to drive home. They play video games, or on nights when Jared can convince him, Jensen plays guitar. They stay up talking and laughing and then retreat to their rooms for bed without ever having to leave the house. 

Jensen becomes used to the routine with an ease that kind of scares him, and he starts noticing little things that he doesn’t quite know what to do with. 

Jared takes longer to get ready in the mornings, and Jensen enjoys giving him a hard time about. But he also enjoys seeing Jared hop into the car with his hair still wet from his shower, tucked under a beanie that Jensen teases mostly in hopes that he’ll take it off because he finds something indescribably nice about seeing Jared’s wet hair. 

They decide it’s easier to share food, and Jensen lets Jared grocery shop because Jared loves food so much more than he does it just makes sense. Jensen is oddly touched when Jared starts buying the Greek yogurt that Jensen likes even though he had always teased Jensen about it being a fad. 

He loves having the dogs around and is flattered that they beg him for food the same way they do Jared. On days when Jared is running particularly late, Jensen will run them in the mornings. He beams with pride as Jared watches with a smile when they all come back and Jensen removes their leashes as they sit calmly for Jensen in a way they don’t for anyone else but Jared. 

Jensen notices himself making small changes to his routine. He gets used to bringing Jared back something whenever he runs an errand. He buys gummy candy or these sweet potato chips Jared has become obsessed with and leaves them on the counter or tosses them on Jared’s dresser, out of reach of the dogs, but where Jared will see them as soon as he comes in the room. 

Sometimes when Jensen is just going down the street to Tim Horton’s for coffee, he’ll pull on one of Jared’s huge hoodies without asking, enjoying how it feel oversized and huge around him. He notices he starts to like the smell and tells himself that’s because he has started associating the scent with coffee in the morning that he feels so comforted by it. So much so that one day instead of throwing the hoodie back in Jared’s room when he returns, he brings it up to his own room and hangs it up in his own closet.

He finds himself cooking, something he never really did before and starts taking pride when he cooks something that Jared likes. He catches himself surfing the Internet, looking for recipes he thinks Jared might enjoy. When a particular dish earns him a contented groan from Jared, he finds himself storing away the memory for later. He’s surprised to find he’s not just filing away the recipe, but the look on Jared’s face, how his tongue swiped across his lower lip, how his eyes went dark and then closed, how his voice sounded rough when he said he loved it. 

His favorite new tradition has become them working out together in the gym Jared set up in the garage. They run side-by-side on twin treadmills or take turns spotting each other during weights. Jensen always skips a day in between lifting, but Jared tends to push himself and is rewarded with a sore back and tight muscles that even the long, hot showers he likes to take won’t soothe. 

One day after a particularly vigorous workout left Jared sprawled out on the couch and aching, Jensen had led Jared into his own bedroom (which is downstairs as opposed to Jared’s being up). He gently pushed Jared down onto the bed on his stomach and straddled him. Jensen has given Jared massages before – when he’s feeling especially stressed about a scene on their way to work – but they’re normally just calming neck rubs in the back of an SUV. Here, with Jared laid out beneath him, Jensen noticed himself taking the time to pull Jared t-shirt up and map out the impressively-defined muscle with his fingers. He had traced Jared’s shoulder blades and down the spine of his back, shivering when he felt Jared react to his hands. He found himself memorizing every sound Jared was emitting, taking joy in every moan and whimper each movement was eliciting. 

Jensen hasn’t let himself focus on how much his own body reacted to this, calling it a million different things before he would ever let his mind settle on “arousal.” He knew if he thought about it too hard, he would have to admit that the feeling was unmistakable as was the insistent and traitorous erection that tented his sweat pants each time he sat above Jared, and that required some truly impressive mental gymnastics to justify as an indicator of something else. So he didn’t let himself think too hard about it. Instead, he began insisting on rubbing Jared’s back as often as he could get away with it, and came up with a number of excuses for why, as soon as Jared retreats to his own room, he will lay in the spot that still smells like him, desperate and aching, and bring himself to a quick and messy release. 

He spends a lot of time actively not focusing on things like that and instead just appreciating nights like this. Nice, non-confusing nights where he’s just content with the fact that living with his best friend means coming home and realizing that everyone he really wants to be with is there with him. 

“OK, come on, sing to me.” Jared sits on the other side of the couch from Jared and kicks him gently. “You’ve been tuning forever.” 

“What do you want me to play?” Jensen’s eyes dance softly as he looks at Jared.

Jared bites his lip and looks almost shy, which alone is enough to make Jensen laugh. “I don’t know,” he finally shrugs. “A song that makes you think of me.”

Jensen looks thoughtful for a minute and then grins as he strums the first few chords of an acoustic version of “Breakin’ Free” from High School Musical while laughing. 

Jared makes a face. “Should I point out that you’re the one who even _knows_ that song? Be for real. Play me something.” 

Jensen thinks again for a moment and begins strumming a tune that it takes Jared a moment to recognize. 

“Walk on the Ocean?” Jared asks. “Come on, Jen, be for real.” 

“Wait no, I am for real, listen.” Jensen hums to catch up with the music and begins to sing softly. “… _Where are we going, so far away_ / _Somebody told me/This is the place/Where everything’s better/And everything’s safe_.” 

Jared stares for a moments and Jensen shrugs. “That – that line makes me think of you.”

Jared looks at him seriously. “Thanks Jen.” he says softly, clearly touched enough that it makes Jensen shift uncomfortably. 

There’s a beat, and Jared gives a small smile. “Can I ask you something?” 

“Shoot.” Jensen sets his guitar down and looks at Jared. 

Jared pauses. His face flashes something Jensen doesn’t recognize and then grins. “Do you want to host a premiere party?” 

Jensen snorts. “That’s what you wanted to ask me?” 

“Yeah. Krip would probably do it, but I think we should. We can grill and have everyone over.” 

“Sure,” Jensen says uncertainly, wondering if there was maybe more Jared had wanted to talk about. Dropping it, he grins. “Let’s have a party.” 

The premiere is on Thursday, which is a good day for a party because they aren’t filming the next episode yet, just blocking and working out choreography on a few stunts. The guys don’t have to be on set until 10 am the next day, and then it’s the weekend, so everyone feels like they can let loose a bit. 

Jared had gone shopping for the party earlier in the week, texting Jensen no less than twelve times with various questions that didn’t matter until Jensen had finally rolled his eyes, and driven to the store to meet Jared and help him shop. Jared ultimately still wound up making all the decisions, but he said he just liked having Jensen there with him. 

“Are we ready?” Jensen asks looking things over half an hour before people will arrive. He had wrapped first, so he’d come home and began pulling out food and prepping things to go on the grill. Jensen walks around the table, pulling a cherry tomato off a skewer and holds it up to Jared. Jared opens his mouth and allows Jared to pop the tomato into his mouth, and Jensen brings his thumb to his own mouth after, licking off a bit of marinade. 

Jensen freezes when he realizes what he’d just done, but Jared just grins, all teeth and dimples, the way he does when Jensen just nails a scene or orders just the right kind of pizza or when anything else turns out exactly as Jared hoped it would. Jensen stammers for a minute, and Jared starts to say something, but they are both interrupted by Cliff who, either fortunately or unfortunately, decided to arrive early. 

Two hours later, cast and crew has eaten, drank, and partied for all they are worth on what is still a work night. Slowed by alcohol and sated by a premiere well-received, those who remain sit lazily around the living and dining room, finishing drinks and congratulating each other. 

Eric stands and holds his glass up. “Before I have any more to drink and am not able to drive myself home let alone address a group, I want to say something. Thank you all for your hard work, your amazing dedication, and your patience in putting up with me.” The group laughs and Eric looks serious. “I know this is a period of uncertainty for everyone, and I want the writers to know we’re with you till the end, no matter what. I know we ask a lot of you every day, and it’s hard when it seems like we can never just sit back and relax. But I want you all to know that this show wouldn’t be what it is without each and every one of you, this premiere wouldn’t be what it was without each and every one of you, and I wouldn’t be who I am without each and every one of you. Finally, I want to thank our amazing stars and hosts for the evening,” he raises his glass to both Jared and Jensen who smile amid cheers from the group. “You all set the tone every day, and it’s an absolute honor to work with you. This show wouldn’t work without the chemistry between you, so I want to echo a sentiment I know you both think about a thousand times a day: We’re all really lucky you have each other as best friends.” 

The group laughs and Jared looks at Jensen and gestures for him to say something. Jensen gives a chuckle and shakes his head. “Ditto!” he calls out finally and the groups laughs good naturedly. 

Jared straightens up. “OK, I’ll say something. I want to echo everything Eric just said. Jensen and I are so grateful for every single person who works so hard on this show every day and just makes it what it is. That premiere kicked ass, y’all, no kidding, and it definitely wasn’t because of us, so thank you.” He pauses and turns to Jensen. “I also want to thank you – to thank Jensen – because you are – every good thing I do on this show is only because I’m trying to either live up to you or impress you. You’re my – you’re my best friend, and you’re – you’re that place for me too. Where everything’s better and everything’s safe.” He holds up his cup to toast with Jensen, who pulls him into a fierce hug. 

They’re close enough that Jensen can smell Jared which makes him think of the hoodie he now considers his favorite currently hanging in his closet, which makes him think about running to get coffee on lazy mornings which makes him think about sitting quietly in their living room together, about dinners at home, about Greek yogurt, and working out together, and back rubs, and laying in his bed while he comes hard smelling _that smell_ and for the first time, Jensen lets himself think about all of it too hard.

 


	3. Gate's Good

_Dying sucks_ , Jensen thinks wryly as he lays on the ground, looking up at Jared through slitted eyes trying to figure out how far along they are in finishing what is starting to feel like the longest shot in history. 

“Jensen!” Bob calls immediately. “Close your damn eyes!” Jensen pointedly opens his eyes for a moment, long enough to roll them at Bob, and snaps them shut. 

“Action!” Bob calls again for what feels to Jensen to be the nineteenth time but according to the marker is only the third. It shouldn’t be a particularly complicated shot except that because they’ll need to use special effects to create a ghost standing over Dean’s body. If they nail it, the result will be a fantastic and creepy shot, but they need to get several moving parts exactly right or it’ll look ridiculous. 

Jensen’s mind fixates on the unsettling truth of that fact. It’s truly frightening how easy it is for something to go from “incredible” to “disaster” depending on something as simultaneously small and monumental as timing. 

“Wait – hold it!” Bob calls again almost immediately as a number of people all crowd around the camera to fix something. Jensen opens his eyes again and Jared stares down at him. Jared gives a small shrug. 

“Guys we’re gonna need like 15 minutes. Jensen, don’t move. We have you positioned just right.” Bob yells and Jensen huffs out a sigh. 

“Do you need food or anything? I can bring you stuff. Or, I don’t know. Read your emails or whatever to you.” Jared asks hopefully, eager to do something to ease Jensen’s obvious tension. 

Jensen has been lying on the ground now for about twenty minutes, and once they settled on exactly where he needs to be for the effects to work, they haven’t let him move. Jared has been like an anxious puppy, walking back and forth between Jensen and the production team, trying to entertain Jensen and trying to hurry the production team along ( _by magic, apparently_ , Jensen can’t help thinking because Jared, for all his talents, and Jensen isn’t afraid to note he has many, is completely useless on the production side of their show. Not only does he share none of Jensen’s desire to direct, he seems downright dedicated to the idea of finishing his entire professional acting career without ever learning what goes on on the other side of the camera). 

Jensen takes pity on him. “Hey, J, can you get me a bottle of water?” 

Jared’s face literally lights up at the ability to help. “Sure, man, yeah!” Jensen can’t help but laugh as Jared actually runs off to craft services and returns with a bottle. 

“Here,” he hands him a bottle and Jensen notes that it’s perfect – just on the cold side of tepid as opposed to the ice cold ones in the bottom of the cooler that make his teeth hurt or the room temperature ones that have been sitting out since Bob called lunch hours ago. 

“Perfect, thanks.” Jensen takes a big swig of water he doesn’t really want, and is rewarded with Jared’s huge smile, all dimples and teeth. Then with an ungraceful flop Jared is on the ground next to him. Suddenly lying on the ground, take three or take thirty, doesn’t matter. Just as long as Jared keeps smiling like that. 

Jensen trains his eyes to focus on the water bottle. He hasn’t been able to stop thinking about Jared ever since the season premiere and that _hug_ , and it’s really started to mess with his mind. Now that he’s had the benefit of distance – only two weeks, but still – he feels confident about how to handle whatever this is. 

Jensen may have grown up in a conservative family in Texas, but he has been in Los Angeles a long time, and he has long-since shed the knee-jerk homophobia he will now admit he came to Hollywood with as a young man, which is why he is so quickly able to dismiss the idea that he has feelings for Jared and is just uncomfortable with it. 

Instead, he reasons, what he is feeling is loneliness. 

It’s been awhile since Jensen has dated anyone seriously, and by far the most intimate relationship in his life is Jared. And especially since he hasn’t really thought of dating since Jared broke up with Sandy and they moved in together ( _out of solidarity_ , he reminds himself, to stop his traitorous brain from making any more of it) it makes sense that he would start to sexualize the one relationship that he is invested in right now.

Besides, it makes sense because Jared is such a physical person. It took some getting used to because Jared was always touching and hugging Jensen, throwing his arm around him or jumping on his back. Once Jensen got comfortable with Jared, that level of affection had started to seem normal, and he even stepped outside of his more reserved demeanor and returned it. That, coupled with the fact that he hasn’t been dating, was more than enough to convince Jensen there was nothing to be concerned about in his confusing feelings for his friend. 

 _So it’s occasionally to smell him_ , Jensen had shrugged it off after he had given the situation some more thought. _So what? He probably just smells familiar. He probably stole my shampoo. The little shit._  

And for two weeks, this thought has comforted him. For two weeks it has calmed him while they continued to spend every second together. But right now it wasn’t helping because right now, Jensen can’t stop staring at Jared’s stupid dimples. 

“Jen?” Jared broke into Jensen’s thoughts. “You look happy. What are you thinking about?” 

“I have a date.” The words slip out of his mouth so quickly he doesn’t even have time to wonder what the hell he’s thinking. 

Jared looks shocked. Then confused. Then something Jensen is too busy convincing himself isn’t jealous to really focus on before it settles on genuine happiness. “Wow, man, good for you! Did you call Danneel?” 

“Yeah,” Jensen continues to lie with ease that should concern him. “We’re going out tonight when we get into LA. I meant to mention I can’t meet up with you and the guys tonight.” 

“Yeah, no problem. That’s – that really is great, man.” 

“Yeah,” Jensen says hollowly trying to calculate in his head the likelihood that Danneel will actually be free if he texts her right now to ask her out tonight. He could just _say_ he is going out with her and then disappear for a few hours, but Chad will definitely sell him out – even if it is an accident – and bring the whole thing up to Danneel at some point. 

Luckily at that moment production needs Jared so he pulls himself off and goes over to work out some blocking and Jensen has a moment to pull his phone out and fire off a quick text to Danneel. 

To Danneel Harris: _Hey you_

To Jensen Ackles: _Hey yourself. You busy saving the world?_

To Danneel Harris: _I do what I can. Listen, last minute change of plans, but I’ll be in LA tonight. Any chance you’re free for drinks? Maybe dinner? Luck please be a lady tonight…_

To Jensen Ackles: _Actually, Hillarie just bailed on me. Do you have my phone tapped or something?_

To Danneel Harris: _I just got lucky I suppose_

To Jensen Ackles: _You got lucky, huh? You think I’m that easy, Ackles?_

To Danneel Harris: _A guy can hope ;) OK, he can buy drinks and dinner and then hope? ;)_

To Jensen Ackles: _Now that you offered, I’m holding you to it, but for future reference, just drinks would have sufficed. What? Luck’s a lady; I’m not ;)_

To Danneel Harris: _You’re just way funnier than you have any reason to be. I’ll see you tonight._

To Jensen Ackles: _Let me know when you land._  

Disaster averted, Jensen puts his phone back in his pocket, but is surprised when this doesn’t relieve the tension he’s felt building up since he told Jared he had a date. As Jared lopes back over, Jensen fixes him with a stare.

“What the fuck is taking so long?” He hears his own voice and winces. Jared looks at him curiously. 

“Sorry,” Jensen begins, “Am I being a dick?” He immediately smiles when Jared cocks his head in a way that lets him know _yes, he is being a dick, but Jared won’t say so_. 

“I’m just exhausted and lying on the ground is surprisingly taxing.” 

“Plus you have your date,” Jared volunteers, his voice kind of tight. 

“Yeah,” Jensen agrees emptily. 

“I think maybe it’s my turn to give _you_ a massage,” Jared says with a sly smile that almost feels like flirting. 

“That’d be – yeah.” Jensen is embarrassed to hear him agree so quickly. 

“Or maybe you can get Danneel to rub you down,” Jared teases, but there’s something behind his voice. A questioning tone. 

“Yeah, right,” Jensen shrugs. “She’s not looking for anything serious.” Jensen wonders when he became such an impressive lying liar who lies. 

Jared nods but looks relieved and the tension slowly starts to bleed from Jensen’s body. 

“Alright, I think we’re ready!” Bob calls out and Jensen and Jared both ease into character and the scene begins. 

*************************************************************************************************************************************************** 

“Cut!” Bob calls out and Greg, who is first A.D. on this episode stares at him expectantly for a moment. “We got it,” Bob says with a nod. Jared reaches down a hand and pulls Jensen up from where Dean is supposed to lay unconscious in this shot. Jared follows the stunt choreographer to start setting up for the next shot. 

“Check the gate!” Greg yells and the first A.C., Jorge, snaps into gear. Quickly, Adam, an Assistant DP, jogs over to Jensen. 

“Hey man,” Adam says urgently. “Hey. Finish that story you were telling before this shot? About the sunglasses?” 

Jensen looks confused. It had been so long ago he could barely remember what they has been talking about, and when he did remember, he couldn’t imagine why Adam cared. It hadn’t really been a story. It was barely an anecdote. And it wasn’t even interesting to him and he was the star of the non-story. Shrugging he continues. “There’s not really much more to tell. I broke my sunglasses last week when I knocked them out the car, so I went yesterday at lunch to buy another pair. But I couldn’t find them, and then I remembered that my glasses had actually been Jared’s first but he made me trade because he liked mine better. So I had to text him to have him tell me where he got them.” 

As Jensen finishes with a shrug, Jorge calls out, “Gate’s good!” 

“Damn it!” Adam exclaims as Greg confirms, “Good gate! Moving on!” 

Jensen looks bewildered before giving a loud laugh. “What the hell was that?” he exclaims throwing his hands up. 

Adam looks sheepish for a moment as he is forced to shake his head at several members of the production team looking at him expectantly and snickering as they walk off to set up the next shot. 

“No, seriously, what’s up?” Jensen doesn’t look like he’s going to drop this, so Adam relents. 

“It’s a joke,” Adam explains easily. “Have you ever noticed that whenever you or Jared tell a story it involves the other one?” 

Jensen scoffs. “That’s not true,” he returns automatically, though even as the words leave his mouth he is forced to admit that it likely _is_ true. They’re in all of each other’s stories, and Jensen can’t even remember when that happened. 

“So there’s a bet to see which of us can get one of you to tell a story that doesn’t involve the other one. To win, someone has to get one of you to finish a story without mentioning the other one. Jensen rolls his eyes so Adam continues. “It used to be the story couldn’t involve the other one at all, but we started to think that was impossible, so we changed it – now we just need to get you to finish the story without saying the other person’s name before they finish checking the gate.” 

“How the hell long have you been playing this game?”  

Adam shrugs. “I came end of first season. They’d already been playing for awhile.” 

“Has anyone ever won?” 

“McPherson. You told him about your sister getting the chicken pox when his son got it.”  

“It’s just because we spend all of our time together,” Jensen explains more defensively than he needs to. “You try telling a story that doesn’t involve this place.” 

Adam gives a small shrug. 

Jensen looks up.“ Wait, so now you just told me so doesn’t that ruin the bet? Now I can just make it so whoever I want to win will win.” 

“No,” Adam gives another grin. “Because I honestly don’t think you could do it even if you tried.” 

Jensen starts to argue, but Bob picks that moment to look at the clock and realize the boys have a plane to catch. “Alright, guys, you’re wrapped. We’ll see you Monday.” 

Jared and Jensen head to the car and then to the airport. Jared realizes he forgot his Kindle so makes Jensen share his I-Pad, and they watch episodes of The Last Airbender in relative silence during the flight down. When they land and make their way to where they have – for the first time in a long time – separate reserved cars, Jared looks at Jensen. 

“This is weird. I feel like I can’t remember the last time we spent the night apart sense we’ve been spending so many weekends in Vancouver lately.” 

“Yeah. But, I mean. I’ll see you tomorrow night for Chris’ Halloween party.” 

“Or tonight if you blow it.” 

Jensen grins. “Or tonight if I blow it.” 

Jared nods. “OK, well. Good luck. Um. I don’t know, just close your eyes and think of England.” 

Jensen throws his head back and laughs. “Fuck you. I’ll see you tomorrow.” 

***************************************************************************************************************************************************

An hour later, Jensen is sitting at a wine bar in Santa Monica. He looks up when Danneel walks in, and he isn’t alone. A number of people look up and watch her walk toward him. Some of them clearly recognize her, but a number of them are simply checking out a hot woman. He finds himself feeling nervous and forces himself to admit he’s unfairly thinking of this night as a test. On some level, he’s conscious of the fact that if he can have feelings for Danneel, then he can ignore whatever this thing he’s feeling for Jared. He stands up and grins at her and the smile she gives makes him feel immediately more at ease. 

“Hey,” he says with a smile kissing her cheek softly. 

“Hey,” she responds. 

“Pinot noir?” He holds up a glass for her and she takes it happily. 

“How did you know?” 

Jensen looks completely serious. “I tapped your phone.” 

The laugh Danneel gives melts the rest of his nerves. 

Jensen had made dinner reservations at the Italian place across the street. They have an hour and a half, so they plan to have drinks at the wine bar and head to the restaurant. 

But when Jensen checks the time to make sure they’re on schedule, Danneel compliments his watch and Jensen explains it was a gift from Jared. And then the bartender suggests a different pinot that has a chocolate-y finish, and Jensen tells Danneel about how he introduced Jared to wine and now he loves the stuff. By the time Jensen is laughing about how Danneel’s insistence on tap water made him think about Jared’s new aversion to sparkling water because of a unfortunate association with Alka Seltzer, he notices that instead of laughing, Danneel is giving him a sad smile. 

“I’m sorry,” Jensen apologizes. “Have I been talking too much?”  

“Not at all,” Danneel answers honestly. In between his stories, he’s asked her a number of questions and has seemed genuinely interested in all of her answers. 

“What’s wrong?” 

“I’m bummed. Because I think I’m gonna leave.” 

Jensen looks momentarily stunned and then starts smiling at what he thinks is a joke. 

“Jensen what did I tell you the first night we hung out?” 

“That Chad should stop sleeping with his stalker.” 

Danneel grins. “That intruding on something that’s already going on really isn’t my style.” 

Jensen slowly shakes his head as he realizes what she’s saying. “No,” he insists. “No, no, no no, no. That’s not – it’s –“ 

“It is. It’s fine. But that’s what it is.” 

“Danneel, no.” Jensen pleads with more certainty than he actually feels. Truthfully he feels kind of dizzy, and he can feel his face flushing, and he wants to blame the wine but he knows that’s not it. 

“Jensen you – " 

“I know we tell stories about each other constantly. The crew actually has a game about it. To try to get one of us to finish a story that doesn’t involve the other. But it’s just because we spend so much time together.” 

Danneel leans her side to the side, and her hair falls over to frame her face perfectly. She gives a small sigh. “Honey, its not that he’s in all your stories. It’s the look on your face when he’s in all your stories. Like you want him to be in all your stories. Like you would be perfectly happy if, for the rest of your life, you didn’t ever have to tell another story that he wasn’t in. And that’s fine, but…isn’t that what falling in love is? Meeting that person who you want to be in all your stories?” 

When she says it, it’s so simple.

It’s the most simple and straightforward and truest thing he’s ever heard that he’s actually embarrassed he had to figure it out this way. Like the time a fortune cookie had advised him to “say I love you freely”, which he had stepped out of his comfort zone and done to his grandmother the next time he spoke to her, and she died a week after that. Or the time a jerk of a cab driver had annoyed him one New Year’s Eve for the entire car ride from the Burbank Airport to Hollywood, but then advised him as he was leaving to be careful because “drunk driving went up this year.” It was with that admonition in mind that Jensen had waited to cross an intersection even though he had the light and missed getting plowed into by a drunk driver who barreled through the light. 

On television, the life changing wisdom is dispensed with some kind of warning sign, or at least with a catchy song playing in the background, but it doesn’t ever seem to work like that for Jensen. His life keeps getting changed in the most laughable ways – while taking advice from cookies and riding in cars with idiots. 

Of course he would realize he’s in love after three glasses of wine on a date with someone else. 

The part he chooses to focus on turns out to be the very least important. “But. I’m not gay.” 

Danneel actually laughs at this. “My grandma used to tell me this story. A man walks up – I’m gonna screw it up – hold on. OK, so a man is standing on a street corner, and he waves his hand and he brings about thunder, lightening, and rain, and then he makes it all stop. A Christian walks up to him and says, ‘how did you do that?’ The man says, ‘I can perform any miracle you want. What do you want me to do.’ So the Christian says, ‘Are you Jesus?’ The man says ‘no’ so the Christian walks away. He does the same thing and a Muslim man walks up, and the guy again offers to perform any miracle and the Muslim man asks, ‘are you Allah?’ The man says no, so he walks away. Then a child walks up. And he doesn’t know what he believes yet and the man offers to perform a miracle and the child asks, ‘are you a good person?’ and the man says ‘yes.’ So the child asks for peace on Earth and the man makes it so. The point is, here are these devout men who if you asked them if they had one wish they would wish for peace in a heartbeat, but when it’s presented to them, they get too hung up on what you call stuff. If you get too caught up on labels, you’re gonna miss the miracle. Anyway, it’s a long story, and I probably told it wrong.” 

Jensen looked serious and said, “no, I think you told it right.” 

Danneel smiles at him for a long moment and then nods her head toward the door. “Go,” she says softly. 

Jensen pays the bill and leaves.

*************************************************************************************************************************************************** 

The next morning, when Jensen wakes up in Jared’s bed, tangled up in each other, sweaty, and sticky from sleep and sweat and a hasty clean up job, but sated and happy and indescribably warm, he rolls over sleepily and fixes Jared with a stare until he opens an eye. 

Jared gives a slow smile. “What?” 

“Slushees or Saddles?” Jensen asks, voice roughened from sleep. 

Jensen is thrilled, but not surprised, when Jared gives the smile that Jensen loves – all dimples and teeth – and responds, “Saddles.”


	4. Even Muppets Would Be Proud

In LA, Jensen lives in Malibu. It’s not particularly convenient from the spots in Santa Monica or Hollywood that he frequents or even the smaller places in Beverly Hills that he complains about having to go to, but secretly loves (a fact Jared had once called him on and subsequently had to pay their bar tab and wrap Jensen into a tight hug to stop his pouting even though he knew – deep down – that Jared had been right). 

It’s not easy to get to or from either Burbank or LAX and there is nothing more frustrating than trying to get from his house to his agent’s office in Century City when rush hour traffic transforms the PCH into a parking lot. But he lives on the beach. And the proud and awestruck look on his father’s face when he came out to visit for the first time and saw that he could walk right out to a secluded section where he could walk right out to the water from Jensen’s bedroom was enough to make the commutes worth it. Jensen absolutely loves his house in Malibu. 

However, the previous night, when Jensen had the wine bar call the car service where he had an account and a car arrived five minutes later, he hadn’t even thought to give his address. Instead, barely thinking, he rattled off Jared’s address in Studio City. 

It hadn’t occurred to Jensen until he was standing in front of Jared’s door that maybe he’d already headed out with their friends for the night and wouldn’t be home. Neither of them had keys to the other’s home in LA since the distance between them made it unlikely either of them ever would drop by unannounced. Jensen realized he maybe should have thought this through. 

Fortunately, a minute later, Jared was standing in front of the door, smiling at him curiously, but stepping aside to let him in as Jensen shrugged off his light jacket. 

“I didn’t think you’d _actually_ blow it,” Jared said, a teasing smile on his face but a genuine question in his voice. “Now I feel like I cursed you.” 

“I need a drink,” Jensen intoned by way of response and followed Jared to the bar near his pool table. He snorted a laugh when he spotted something called Tennessee Honey Jack Daniels and held it up. 

“You’re the one that introduced me to whiskey with honey in it,” Jared had protested. 

“Yeah, and when I did that, I made you a whiskey and put honey in it. I didn’t tell you to go buy some pre-mixed shit, which is like, one step up from those TGIF Mudslides that sorority girls buy that come already made in a jug,” Jensen laughed and Jared tried to glare but ended up belly laughing back. He grabbed a glass, puts some ice in it, and poured a generous shot of the amber liquid. He handed it to Jensen. “Just fucking try it, asshole.” 

Jensen held the glass up to his lip and sipped, keeping his eyes on Jared the whole time. He had to admit it tasted good, and the smooth warmth he felt as it slid down his throat swiftly overpowered the delicate spiciness of the pinot noir still on his tongue from earlier. 

Jensen smiled, “it’s good, Jared. You’re totally right.” Jared smiled proudly. “I knew you’d like it.” 

“What are the guys doing tonight?” 

“Bar in Mid-Wilshire. Or…I think the Hollywood Hills?” 

“Do you want to bail? We’ll see them tomorrow anyway.” 

Jared licked his lips and took Jensen’s drink out of his hand. Jensen couldn’t help notice he turned the glass so he was drinking out of the same side that he had just been drinking out of and took a long swallow. “Yeah. Fuck it. Let’s stay here.” 

Twenty-five minutes and half a bottle later, Jensen and Jared were sprawled out on Jared’s couch feeling extremely buzzed but not at all tired. There was an electric energy between them, and while they had kept the conversation superficial, the air felt heavy between them. 

Emboldened by the last drink, Jensen stood up to get them refills and when he returned, he sat closer to Jared on the couch. Jared, whose legs had been stretched out between them on the huge sectional, moved his legs so Jensen could sit and promptly placed them on Jensen’s lap. Jensen idly rubbed them and handed Jared a glass. 

At that moment, Jared’s phone beeped with an annoying drunk text from Chad giving him a hard time for not coming out tonight. He’d handed the phone to Jensen, letting him type out a snarky reply and sent it laughing. When he looked up, Jared was staring at him seriously. 

“Why didn’t you want to go out tonight with the guys?” Jared said after he’d taken a drink. 

“I don’t think we get to spend enough time together,” Jensen deadpanned. 

“For real though.” 

Jensen shrugged. “Did you want to go out?” 

“I don’t care. This is all we’d do at a bar anyway. This way we don’t have to wait for a bartender. Or get cabs at the end of the night. You’ll crash here, right?” 

Jensen nodded and gave a laugh. “We’re ridiculous.” 

“We are not. I’m gonna defend us. We’re awesome,” Jared drawled, his Texan accent coming through as the alcohol took hold. 

“Normal, well-adjusted people – you know, the people who they tell you to be when you grow up on, like, Mister Rogers and Sesame Street and shit? They don’t do this. They appreciate alone time. They don’t live and work with their best friend and then – when they finally are in a city where they have their own houses – they don’t crash in each others’ guest rooms because they missed each other more than they missed their own bed.” 

Jared had stared at Jensen for a moment and then grinned. “That’s why you came here? You missed me?” 

Jensen threw his head back in mock frustration and took a huge drink. He drummed his fingers on Jared’s thigh, still in his lap, but he said nothing. 

“I don’t know why you think PBS would hate on us so much. What I remember from those shows is how you’re supposed to show you love the people you love, and be open, and be honest about how you’re feeling.” Jared runs his fingers through his hair and grins. “I think we do pretty good by Sesame Street standards.” 

“OK. You want 'open, Sesame Street honesty?' Bring it. I will out co-dependent your ass." 

“Oh, it’s on. Go.” 

“I got in a car tonight and realized that I felt homesick for you. So I came here instead of my house even though I didn’t know for sure you’d be home.” 

Jared straightened up, rising to the challenge. “I can do better than that. Jensen, I spend all my fucking time with you, but I was actually super jealous you were hanging with someone else tonight. I missed you.” 

“OK. I didn’t want to go out with the guys tonight because I didn’t want to share you with anyone else. Now, I _know_ I was supposed to learn sharing from one of those shows.” 

“I left my Kindle at home on purpose so you’d have to share your I-Pad because I wanted us doing the same thing on the flight down here.” 

“Danneel left tonight because I told too many stories about you.” It wasn’t completely true, but Jensen wasn’t sure where this was going, and he didn’t want to freak Jared out. It had turned out not to matter. 

“Sandy broke up with me because of you.” 

“Wait – what?” Jensen suddenly sounded more sober than he felt, and his hand immediately went to Jared’s back. “What the hell?” 

Jared shook his head. “This is why I didn’t tell you. I didn’t want you to make a whole thing about it. I shouldn’t have said it like that. It wasn’t just you. It was the dogs.” 

Jensen laughed in spite of himself. “What the hell are you talking about?” 

“Sandy was over. We were taking the dogs for a walk, and they were being impossible and jumping around. And she was trying to help me get their collars on. So, I had Sadie, and I said, ‘Harley, go to Mommy.’ You had left over that stupid army jacket you have for summer?” 

“It’s not stupid,” Jensen had interjected. “You have no light coats. This is why you’re always freezing in the summer, and I’m always the perfect temperature.” 

“It’s ugly.” Jared said with a smile. “And it smelled like you and you’d left it at my house when you stayed over on my birthday and it was sitting on my couch forever because as ugly as it is I actually liked it there and Harley went and picked it up instead of going to Sandy.” 

Jensen is stunned for a moment. “That wasn’t – it wasn’t even – ” 

“Obviously she didn’t just break up with me after that. But it started a conversation about how much time we spend together and how I don’t make an effort to have a life outside the show – outside of you – and she honestly couldn’t tell anymore if it’s because it’s hard or if it’s because I don’t want one.” Jared’s voice drops and he raises his glass to finish his drink and says into the glass, “And I couldn’t tell either, so. There you go.” 

He finished his drink in one gulp and looked to Jensen equal parts guilty, embarrassed, and relieved. “So? Do I win? Did I do right by Mister Rogers?” 

Jensen had nodded. “Even the muppets would be proud.” 

There was a moment of silence between them before Jared offered. “I’m sorry about Danneel.” 

“I’m sorry about Sandy.” 

“Don’t be.” And then after a beat, Jared said something Jensen would be grateful for for the rest of his life. “She was right.” 

That’s when Jensen leaned in to Jared, and didn’t let himself pull back. The kiss tasked smoky. Like whiskey and honey and warmth and aftershave, and Blistex, and a slight tang from sweat. The scents mixing together, simultaneously so familiar and comfortable but somehow new and exhilarating when tasted off each other’s skin. 

Jensen deepened the kiss, pushing his tongue gently but insistently into Jared’s mouth, which opened easily for him as a small moan escaped. The alcohol and the anticipation mixed together to form desperation in both of them, quickly turning the kiss into a hungry display before they began pawing each other with a lot of enthusiasm but less finesse than either of them imagined they were capable of. 

Jensen, feeling guilty for letting Jared take the lead with confessing their feelings, wanted to let him off the hook, so he took responsibility for standing them up once it became clear neither of them were going to chicken out. The drinks had made them just the right level of loose and confident, so Jensen rubbed his hands down Jared’s sides, pulling him up and holding his hands as they walked backwards into Jared’s room. Once in the room, Jensen hesitated for a minute, but Jared climbed in bed and gestured for Jensen to follow. 

Jared sat up with his back against the headboard and his long legs stretched out in front of him. Jensen climbed on top of him and straddled his legs, leaning in to kiss him once again. 

They’d shimmied down the bed so Jared was flat on his back and Jensen continued to straddle him. Jensen broke the kiss, earning a whimper from Jared as he chased his lips. “Wait,” Jensen had shushed him quietly. “I wanted to do this.” Jared stilled while Jensen ran his hands through Jared’s hair gently. “I’ve wanted to do this for so long.” He continued to play with Jared’s hair until Jared shivered and grinded his hips up so Jensen was aware of how much he was enjoying that as well. 

“I’ve wanted to do _this_ ,” Jared says expansively indicating them together and Jensen smiled. 

“Me too,” he’d admitted. “I’ve wanted this for awhile.” 

“What do you want?” Jared asked cautiously. “What have you thought about?” 

Jensen flushed. “I’ve thought about being above you like this. Like, when I give you massages? But about…riding you.” 

Jared nodded frantically. “Me too. I want that too. I mean, I want – I want to – I want to be inside you.” 

Jensen paused. “Do you know what you’re doing?” 

“Not even a little,” Jared had admitted. 

People have a number of reasons sex between friends can be a great idea. The comfort. The trust. The connection. Jensen couldn’t help think they all missed one because what he considered the most abiding benefit to having sex with his best friend was the ability to stop in the middle, continue kissing and stroking each other, while they looked up the mechanics of what they wanted to do to each other on the Internet. 

A Google search, a frantic look around the house for condoms, lube and the rest of the whiskey, and they were back in bed. 

Kissing escalated quicker this time and by the time they stripped off their shirts and jeans, lust had mostly replaced the jitters and urged them to keep moving. 

“Talk to me,” Jared had begged softly. 

“Like, talk dirty?” Jensen licked his lips and looked curiously at Jared. 

“No – I mean. Well, yeah, definitely, do that. But I just mean. Talk to me. Say stuff. Anything. I’m nervous, and hearing your voice will make me less nervous.” 

“How do you know, though?” 

“Hearing your voice always makes me less nervous.” Jared had said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, like it had always been the most obvious thing in the world, and Jensen had to admit that maybe it was. Or at the very least it should have been. 

They fell into each other, moved together, and fell asleep an hour later, completely tangled up in each other and peaceful.


	5. Oh, Right, We Do This Now

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note: There is Wincest roleplay in this chapter between Jensen and Jared. If that weirds you out, you can skip that section without missing out on any plot continuity.

After he works through the five stages of “I just had sex with my best friend” – which apparently consist of reliving it, freaking _the fuck out_ , grinning like an idiot, confirming it wasn’t the worst idea they’d ever had, and finally, reliving it again for entirely different reasons – Jensen can finally breathe.

Once he hears Jared murmur “saddles,” his chest fills with so much warmth it basically lulls him back to sleep. All the tension he’d been feeling since he woke with a start an hour ago finally bleeds out of his body leaving him feeling completely boneless and at ease.

A few hours later, only a little after eight a.m., they both independently concede defeat to the morning. Try as they might, neither of them can really sleep in. Their bodies are so accustomed to early calls that they both stir despite their best intentions to have a lazy morning.

“Hey,” Jared says softly, almost a whisper, as he rolls over to place a hand on Jensen’s chest.

“Hey,” Jensen responds with a smile.

“How – um – how are you feeling?” Jared’s eyes go a little wide as he tries to figure out how to ask Jensen his question.

“I’m good,” Jensen says automatically without really thinking and begins to bat the question back when Jared interrupts him.

“Are you sore?” Jared clarifies. “Are you sore at all? I can get you aspirin or something, if you want?”

“No, I’m really fine.” Jensen stammers and then, noticing the disbelieving look on Jared’s face, he goes a little red. “I’m – I mean, a little.”

Jared makes a face. “I’m sorry.”

“No – it – Jared. Don’t.” Jensen looks at him with a reassuring smile. Jensen has to admit to himself that he isn’t altogether comfortable, but he can practically _feel_ how uncomfortable Jared is, which helps him to calm down. It’s always like that for Jensen. They can be filming a weird scene or dealing with a new director and Jensen will be feeling uneasy or freaked out, but as soon as he notices Jared is feeling the same way, he feels immediately responsible for making sure Jared feels better and that in turn calms him down as well. It’s a part of their dynamic that has always come so naturally that he never really had given it that much thought, but right now, he is beyond grateful for this particular habit.

“Well, I’ll – I don’t know. Figure out how to do it better.” Jared shifts uncomfortably in bed, but allows himself to roll over and face Jensen. His face is flushed and he’s clearly embarrassed, but he finishes quietly. “I can make it better next time.”

“I don’t know,” Jensen begins with a wry smile. “I think we did it – I think we did it OK, considering. I mean, I actually think we did it pretty great. Don’t you?” Jensen tries to sound nonchalant, but he winces slightly as he hears the insecurity sneak into his voice. _Fuck me,_ he thinks. _I just asked if it was good for him. I’m officially pathetic._

Jared leans into Jensen’s body and kisses his chest. Jensen almost laughs he’s so surprised, but Jared’s fingers are playing at his stomach and suddenly nothing’s funny anymore.

“We did it really great,” Jared says without taking his eyes off Jensen’s body.

It’s the closest they come to talking about it. After that, they let themselves be overtaken by the newness and excitement that they’re _allowed to touch each other_. It’s an odd sensation since they’d long ago shed any pretenses about being able to be hugely hung up about casual invasions of personal space. But there was a tangible difference between feeling completely at ease with arms draped around each other, and being allowed to do _more_.

They spend the morning lounging in bed, reaching over to stroke the other’s arms or chest as if they’re checking to make sure that it’s still in bounds. They get more adventurous a couple of times and let fingers wander to stroke hipbones or graze inner thighs, but they both are surprised to admit to themselves that for co-dependent friends who, from all accounts, seem to have absolutely no boundaries, they are both a little scared to make the first sober move into something explicitly sexual. They reach an unspoken, pseudo-sexual détente: They aren’t freaking out or pretending last night didn’t happen, but neither is quite prepared to re-escalate. 

They stay in bed until around ten when hunger and the heat from the L.A. morning coupled with the lingering sweat and stickiness from the night before force them out of bed to shower and eat something.

Jared lets Jensen take the first shower while he goes to figure out breakfast (which consists of halfheartedly looking in the fridge before silently declaring it a lost cause and having food delivered). When Jared takes his turn in the shower and steps out later, hair wet the way it is every morning Jensen has stared longingly at it, he can’t stop himself from finally reaching out and running his fingers through it, much the same way he had last night when he stopped them from kissing to indulge his long-time fantasy.

“OK, you have to explain this,” Jared inquires good-naturedly. “I mean, you can do it, obviously, you can do whatever you want, but, _why_? What’s with you and my hair?”

Jensen looks sheepish but he doesn’t stop running his fingers through Jared’s locks while he explains. “I just always loved getting to see your hair wet after a shower because it was like, a reminder. That I got to see you first thing in the morning. It was – I guess it was one of the first, um, fantasies I had about you.”

Jared dips down and captures Jensen’s mouth at that, and when the kiss deepens, suddenly, neither of them is hungry anymore. They head to the living room wrapped in each other’s arms, clumsily falling onto the couch. The détente is lifted and they skip breakfast to fuck on the couch while Jared’s hair is still wet.

After that, they kind of can’t keep their hands off each other. They clean up again, head back to the kitchen, but are distracted again by Jared eyeing Jensen’s throat not at all subtly while Jensen takes a long drink from a water bottle, Adam’s apple bobbing gently as he swallows. Jensen catches Jared’s eyes and pulls the water bottle away to grin at him. Jensen pushes Jared against the wall and they make out with Jared tearing away to kiss and suck at Jensen’s neck, promising not to leave marks and Jensen secretly hoping that maybe he will anyway.

They spend a lot of time trying to read each other, both still unsure enough about their abilities that they react to each other gingerly, walking a line between responding to every moan and whimper eagerly and trying not to let overenthusiastism result in any pain or discomfort. Fortunately, it’s easy to do. Jensen is surprised, though he doesn’t know why, because _of course_ the ease with which he and Jared know what the other is thinking would translate to sex as well. It turns out Jensen loves being fingered, and Jared is able to anticipate exactly when to add a second finger before Jensen even has to beg for it. _Slow down_ , _speed up_ , _I’m close_ , get communicated with eyes and gasps more eloquently than either of them would be able to do with words.

Jared leaves the house only once – to get more lube when they realize their over exuberance combined with Jared’s lingering fear of hurting Jensen made quick work of the half tube of KY Jared had had in his nightstand for his own purposes. Jensen naps while he’s gone, and when he returns, Jared slips into bed alongside Jensen, letting Jensen pull him into a spooning position, his back flat against Jensen’s chest.

When they wake up, it’s late afternoon and they pull themselves once again out of bed, more on principle than anything else. They spend the rest of the day being comfortably normal. They talk, they tease, and every once in awhile, when a teasing remark earns a good-natured shove or when one of them gets up to go to the kitchen or bathroom and the other one makes a grab for him, they let their hands linger, or pull each other into a sudden kiss. It’s funny when Jensen let’s himself think about it because touching Jared is such a familiar part of interacting that his mind doesn’t immediately connect it with the newness of their sexual relationship. It’s as though their physical closeness is just them operating from muscle memory, and it takes their brains a moment to catch up and remember, _oh, right, we do this now_.

Evening hits and Jensen receives a text from Chris giving him the details of his Halloween party and warning Jensen not to bail again.

Jared walks back from the kitchen where he’s finishing Jensen’s leftovers from the late lunch they’d ordered in. Jensen looks up grimly.

“What?” Jared freezes.

“Dude. People are wearing costumes to this thing.”

Jared laughs at Jensen’s overreaction. “How do you know?”

Jensen holds up his phone miserably. “Chris just texted. And he’s being a total dick about it and says I won’t hear the end of it if I don’t wear a costume.”

Jared feels bad about laughing but does it anyway because Jensen is being ridiculous.

“I’m not wearing a fucking Halloween costume,” Jensen pouts. “I didn’t bring anything anyway.”

Jared gives another small laugh. “Let’s been Sam and Dean.” He smiles as though the brilliance of the idea hadn’t hit him until he said it out loud. Jensen grins back.

“Dude, that’s perfect! I even forgot to take off that stupid necklace before we left set. I’ll wear that, a leather jacket, and I don’t have to hear Chris complain all night that I didn’t dress up! You’re a genius.”

Jared grins happily, the same way he did when Jensen had conceded last night that the Tennessee Honey was, in fact, really good. Jensen admitted to himself that while Jared sometimes played the “little brother card” to get Jensen to do things, he had a “big brother card” of his own to play. Jared really did love when he was able to impress Jensen with something – some bit of knowledge, a good idea, something Jensen had never heard – and the smile he got in those moments really warmed Jensen’s heart. And that’s why Jensen, apropos of nothing, stands up, walks over to Jared, places his hands on his face, and pulls him down for a quick kiss. When he pulls back, Jensen is grinning and says by way of explanation, “hey, you were totally right, by the way. They didn’t shoot M*A*S*H in Vancouver.” Jared smiles again and Jensen leans back in, this time for a longer kiss.

After a bit of back and forth, it’s decided that Jensen does actually have to go to his own place to get dressed. Since he stopped by their quickly before meeting up with Danneel, the necklace is there, along with a change of clothes. However, they also decide he should stay at Jared’s again tonight and head together to the airport tomorrow, so Jensen goes home, showers, changes into his most Dean-esque outfit, and grabs his things to head back up north the next day. Jensen drives his truck to Jared’s house, parks it there to leave for the week, comes in where Jared has left the door open for him, drops his bags in Jared’s room, not bothering with a pretense that he’d sleep anywhere else, and waits for Jared to get out of the shower. When he hears the shower stop, he pours himself a drink and makes another one for Jared. Jared comes out in a towel and Jensen hands him a scotch. He grins.

“I was hoping you’d be back, man! Help me figure out what to wear.”

Jensen follows Jared to the bedroom and flops down on the bed, spilling his scotch and laughing as he does. He throws his feet up on the bed and watches Jared stare into the closet.

This is one of those moments Jensen’s brain is having a hard time remembering that anything between them is different. He can’t count the number of times he has been enlisted to help Jared decide what to wear. When half of your closet is always in another city, deciding if what you have is actually appropriate for whatever party/premiere/interview you’re dressing for can be a challenge. So nothing feels immediately different about watching Jared, with a towel wrapped around his waist, look through his closet.

Except now, Jensen can’t stop his mind from wandering over his hips, watching the muscles in his bear back work as he reaches up, and feel himself start to get hard thinking about the fact that Jared is completely naked under the towel.

As if he can hear Jensen’s thoughts, Jared turns around and fixes him with a glare. “We don’t have time for whatever you’re thinking,” he drawls but his face is flushed and Jensen can see that he is half hard under the towel so he smiles with amusement.

“You sure?” Jensen purrs softly and stands to walk closer to Jared. Standing directly in front of him, Jensen stares at him softly with a small smirk teasing his lips.

“We’ll be late,” Jared protests halfheartedly as he feels the towel loosen around him and Jensen slowly lower himself in front of Jared.

They’re late.

When they walk into the club Chris has rented out for the night, they are immediately accosted by a very drunk Chad who pulls them over where a group of their friends have set up – what has to be at least a third – round of tequila shots.

Jensen is grateful that they distracted each other from having finished the scotches they poured at home, because that seems like a particularly horrendous mix.

Chad, who is dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow and doing an amusing impression of him as well that Jensen suspects was more accurate and less funny a few drinks ago, is gathering up several shots to press into Jared’s and Jensen’s hands.

“Catch up, assholes,” he slurs with a grin. “Can’t believe you fucking bailed on us last night!” Chad holds up a shot glass in a toast and Jensen and Jared follow suit, each downing one, and then another, following with a bite of lime.

Satisfied that they had finished their shots, Chad turns an eye and actually looks at them for the first time. “What the fuck are you – you’re not wearing costumes!”

“Sure we are!” Jared bellows throwing an arm around Jensen. Jensen can see his confusion. Jared is wearing light jeans, a tight black t-shirt under a green flannel shirt, and black boots. Jensen is wearing dark jeans, a tight black shirt, a brown leather jacket, and boots. He lifts the amulet from his chest and waves it at Chad.

“We’re Sam and Dean,” Jensen crows happily.

Chad takes a moment to process this. “I’m telling Chris!” he declares as he stakes off through the crowd to go tell on them.

Jared still has his arm around Jensen. “Dean, I think we’re in trouble,” he says with fake alarm. Jensen laughs happily and claps Jared on the back.

As they get drunker, the joke gets funnier. Anytime someone calls them out on their costumes, one of them turns to the other in character and leads him into an improtu scene. Sometimes they’re convinced the party is overrun by demons, sometimes they’re at the party doing recon and Dean is having too much fun to focus.

 

When Chris marched over to give Jensen shit for cheating, Jensen immediately grabs Jared. 

“Sammy, you gotta get outta here. He’s only after me.”  
  
“I’m not leaving you, Dean. I’m never leaving you. When are you gonna get that? You’re my big brother and I love you.” 

“Sammy, please, just go! I – I have to protect you.” Jensen lets his voice crack and notices that Jared almost loses it when he does. 

“I can’t survive without you, Dean.” 

“You guys are fucking idiots,” Chris interrupts just in time for both of them to break character completely and start laughing. “And seriously, that’s the scene you improv? It’s almost hard to believe fangirls everywhere think those two are fucking.” 

That makes them laugh even harder and now they can’t stop because _he’s right_ , and the realization of just how much Sam and Dean sound like a couple, plus their own secret they’re keeping from everyone, plus, those last two shots they just took which, ok, yeah, are finally hitting, all come together to make this _hilarious_ to them. 

Chris blames the alcohol and walks away shaking his head. Jared walks outside to the balcony where not many people are because even though it’s a nice night, there’s no bar out there. 

As soon as they are in a corner out of the earshot of the others milling around outside, Jared turns to Jensen looking serious. 

“Dean, I have to tell you something.” 

Jensen immediately lowers his voice and matches Jared’s serious expression. “What’s wrong, Sammy?” 

“The last drink I had was laced with a powerful potion created by a spirit who was killed by his wife who was having an affair. The potion will kill anyone whose keeping a secret, so I have to tell you something.” 

Jensen gives a small smile. They’ve spent a lot of time laughing about how overly complex some of the demons they hunt are, and Jared’s description is clearly partially tongue-in-cheek. However, it’s also clearly partially serious, and Jensen wants to know where he’s going with it. 

“OK, Sammy, well, whatever it is, say it. Quick!” Jensen imbues his voice with as much urgency as he can muster.

“When I was younger – I used to watch you. With um, your ex-girlfriend, Kristen. You remember her?”

“Yeah, I remember.” 

“You were, what, nineteen? I was fifteen. And you used to have her come over when Dad was off on hunts and it was just us.” 

“OK, Sammy, you used to watch me. It’s fine. I always kind of knew you probably weren’t asleep the whole time anyway. Is that it? Spell broken?” 

“That’s not all. I’d never – I mean, I’d never kissed a girl before or anything, and I told myself that’s all I was doing. Trying to learn what to do from my big brother. But – it was more than that. I…got off…watching it.” 

Jensen’s grin is pure Dean. “She was hot,” he answers simply with a shrug.

“I got off watching you.” 

Jared stares at Jensen in awe. Somehow his face is able to flicker shock, disbelief, and arousal all at once. Jensen licks his lips quickly. “Sammy…” 

“I used to get off watching you. Pretending I was the one with you. I wanted you. So bad. And I knew it was wrong and we could never be together and in a million years you could never feel the same way about me and – ” Jared turns away and looks out over the vista as he says, “that’s why I went to Stanford. I lied. It wasn’t to get away from Dad. It was to get away from you.” 

Jensen walks up behind Jared and practically growls in his ear. “We’re leaving now.” 

They walk quickly through the club, telling anyone they run into they’re going to the bar, or the bathroom, or whatever will get them out of the conversation quickest. Tomorrow they’ll claim they actually did say goodbye, everyone was just too drunk to remember. 

A quick cab ride home and they’re back at Jared’s house. Jensen wastes no time getting back into character. 

“Sammy, you should have told me.” 

“How could I, Dean?” 

“Tell me what you used to fantasize about.” Jensen’s voice is low and smooth and Jared resists the urge to pull him into a kiss and instead turns toward him in horror. 

“Come on, Sammy,” he continues, pulling off his shirt, but keeping the amulet on. Thinking about the episode they’ll be filming soon – the Christmas episode – he remembers that the amulet was actually a gift from Sam, so it would be meaningful for them both for Dean to keep it on for this. “I want you to tell me what you used to think about. While you got yourself off thinking about me.” 

“Are you – why?” 

“Because I want to do it.” 

Jensen reaches out and pulls Jared’s shirt off, Jared lets him, still in a mixture of stunned disbelief and excitement. Jensen unbuckles Jared’s jeans and he lets out a moan and Jensen reaches his hand slowly down the front. 

“Fuck, Sammy, you’re so hard already. You really have wanted this since you were fifteen, huh?” 

“Fuck, Dean, yes, please.” Jared whimpers and falls into Jensen’s body and kisses him deeply and desperately. They fall onto the couch still kissing, touching and grinding into each other. “This,” Jared continues. “Always wanted this. I imagined sitting on the couch, with you on my lap, letting me…” Jared trails off as Jensen nips at his neck and adjusts himself in Jared’s lap. 

“This what you want, Sammy? You want me to ride you? You want me to ride you all night?” 

“Fuck, Dean.” Jared grinds his hips up, rubbing their erections together and silently signaling to Jensen that they needed to hurry up because he wouldn’t last. Jensen smiled. 

“I got you, Sammy. I’m gonna give you everything you ever dreamed about.”

After Jensen gets up to grab the condoms and lube, he returns to Jared sitting up on the couch. Jensen straddles him, muscular thighs on either side of his lap and Jensen moves slowly up and down, with Jared’s eyes closed, mouth parted open, like he can’t imagine any place he’d rather be. After a half-hearted clean-up job, they fall asleep for about twenty minutes until they can’t take the discomfort of the position any longer. They stir, alcohol wearing off, and half-drunk, half-tired, stumble to the bedroom laughing at themselves and noting how they just indulged the ultimate fantasy of some of their biggest fans. 

“Don’t tell Tumblr,” Jared says laughing as he closes his eyes.

“Who the fuck is Tumblr?” Jensen replies groggily as he closes his. 


	6. There's No Thrill in Burning Cities Anymore

Jensen kind of can’t believe how easy it is not to talk about. That’s partially because when they come back to Vancouver, it’s to an entirely changed world. Talks finally broken down for good and the Writer’s Strike would happen. They would finish filming the episodes they had banked through mid-November, and then break for the holidays, hiatus and – possibly – forever.

Jensen hadn’t wanted to talk about any of it. Jared had wanted to talk about all of it. They compromised and talked about half of it. The dumbest half of it. 

Instead of talking about their fears about the show coming back and what this means for the professionally, and instead of talking about whatever is between them and what happens to whatever it is if the show ends, they make holiday plans.

“My dad asked what you were doing for the holidays,” Jensen says one night right before Jared headed upstairs to go to bed.

“Um, I assumed I’d go home. My parents’ll kill me if they can’t see me for Christmas.” Jared responds as he gestures for Jensen to follow him up. 

“No, I meant – maybe we could combine everyone this year.”

Jared grins. “That would be awesome. I think everyone would really love that.”

“Right?” Jensen watches as Jared shrugs off his clothes and gets into bed in boxer briefs. He hovers by the door.

Jared looks at him with a tiny smile. “Let’s figure out dates?” He asks. Jensen shrugs off his clothes as well and climbs in. They talk about dates for a while, which eventually leads to kissing without definite plans being decided upon, and promises that they’ll figure it out the next night. 

It’s scarily easy. For the next two weeks of filming before they break for hiatus, this is their routine. Travel plans are broached right before bed, which gives them enough of an excuse as to why they end up in the same bed at the end of the night. 

As far as cover stories go, it’s not perfect. If they really wanted to, it would be easy enough to poke holes in the entire thing. All they had to do was wonder _why_ they only ever thought to bring it up once someone announced he was going to bed. Or why they were always both clearly too tired to stay up fifteen extra minutes to talk about it in the living room, but were never too tired to fuck each other – all night sometimes – once they had dropped the pretense of discussion. Or why it takes two weeks to decide on travel plans which are, as it turns out, not that complicated.

They decide they will host cast and crew for a going away dinner, which they will disguise as a belated Canadian Thanksgiving celebration, spend American Thanksgiving separately to appease the friends and family who never get any time with them, combine their families for Christmas, and book a snowboarding trip for New Year’s Eve. They decide on Vail, even though Jared points out there are plenty of great places in Vancouver.

“But you loved Whistler that time we drove up,” Jared reminds Jensen as they stare at the computer screen trying to book a cabin.

“Vail will feel more like a vacation,” Jensen insists. “We’re _always_ in Vancouver. Whistler’s like an hour from our house. It won’t feel like a trip.”

Jared looks at Jensen curiously, but he shrugs and gives in. He says it’s because the resort Jensen found has a sick hot tub in the master bedroom (which it does), but Jensen suspects it has more to do with the fact that Jared understands that, despite his unwillingness to talk about it, Jensen _is_ struggling with the idea that maybe the show won’t be coming back and the idea of going somewhere local is a little too painful. Jensen is grateful Jared doesn’t call him on it, instead handing over his credit card and insisting they split the rental.

They agree to stay in Colorado through the end of January, noting that their friends will likely come to stay for portions of the trip. Jensen immediately texts Jared’s sister and demands that she come visit for her birthday on the 14th, while Jared just smiles.

Once the plans are made, Jared insists they start shopping for Canadian Thanksgiving. Jensen rolls his eyes, silently wondering when he’d started keeping time by a holiday that wasn’t even his. But he shrugs when he realizes he is equally invested in the celebration of a birthday for a sister that isn’t even his either.

This is why on the last day of shooting, Jensen and Jared are bustling around the kitchen after having given up on trying to cook and having the whole thing catered. Jensen is tense, and Jared doesn’t know why.

“Stop moving everything I put down,” Jensen snaps.

“Stop putting shit in the wrong spot,” Jared responds without missing a beat. He cocks his head and looks at Jensen. “No kidding, what’s up?”

“What’s up – what?”

“You’re being weird. You’ve been being weird all day.” Jared hands Jensen a beer and he takes it, but rubs it in his hands instead of opening it.

“Nothing. Just – I leave day after tomorrow. I’m not really packed.”

“Well, I leave the day after you. Text me anything you forget, and I’ll just bring it.”  
  
“Yeah,” Jensen says emptily. He tries to conjure a knock at the door. He hopes for it so hard that he honestly thinks he hears a car in the driveway and is convinced he made it happen by sheer force of will the way he was sure when he was eight he made it rain one day just by needing it so bad.

Jensen needs a guest to arrive right then because he’s sure if he doesn’t get a distraction, he’ll do something stupid like yell at Jared for not caring that it might be one of their last nights together and he has no idea what that means. Because if they don’t see each other again until Christmas that’s more than a month away and then it’ll be the families and in Vail there won’t be any excuse to fall into the same bed at the end of the night, and so what happens to them after now?

But he’d been the one who insisted on not talking about it, though if he was being honest he’d admit he thought Jared would have pulled the little brother card to force him into doing it anyway. But he hadn’t. Which means maybe _Jared_ didn’t want to talk about it either which could mean anything and –

When he hears the knock, tears almost spring to Jensen’s eyes. He almost says something – anything – to Jared. Instead he simply mumbles, “I’ll get it.”

And so the party begins.

The night begins fairly somber. No one really believes that it’s about Canadian Thanksgiving if for no other reason than it _feels_ like a going away party. The writers are invited but many don't go because they're afraid people resent them for the strike, even though they don’t. Not really. Or at least not much.

Mostly it just feels all night like anything anyone says will sound like goodbye, so people don’t say much. Dinner ends, many people leave, and those who stay start drinking more. And that’s when the party truly begins.

Jensen is playing cards with Serge and a few guys from the camera crew when Jared walks up with a drink. He offers it to Jensen who shakes his head slightly but doesn’t look up.

Serge looks up at Jared, surprised by the uncharacteristically terse interaction between the two and grins. “Fuck, I fold.” 

He throws his cards down and lets out a belly laugh. “If he’s focused so much he can’t even look up at Padalecki, he must have a hell of a hand.” Jensen wins that hand, and Jared plasters a smile on his face as he walks away, but he can’t help the feeling of rejection that creeps up in his throat. For the first time he honestly wonders if the show ends and this is it them, if this will really be _it_ for them.

Jared flops down on the couch and joins a conversation between Eric and Bruce.

“The worst part – Jared we’re talking about the worst part about the show possibly ending – the worst part is Bridezilla.” Eric takes a huge sip of whatever he’s drinking and laughs.

“What? You mean that Bridezilla will still be on the air and we won’t?” Jared leans over confused.

“No,” Eric says in a drunkenly serious voice that indicates he thinks what he is saying is gravely important but perhaps no one else will. “It’s actually – OK, seriously, this show is fucking incredible. It is. Don’t tell my wife. But I love it. It’s actually – it’s a really interesting show about expectations and love. I mean, man. It’s about _love_.”

Bruce laughs. “You’re making no sense, buddy. So what does it have to do with the show getting cancelled?”

“My wife said since most of our T.V. life is dictated by me and my job and supporting the network and everything, she got to pick one show I had to watch with her and shut up about it.”

Jared nods realizing. “Bridezilla.”

“Bridezilla!” Eric agrees. “But the thing is. I fucking love it! But now…” He shakes his head sadly. “You know how fucking depressing it is to be sad over something you have to pretend you didn’t care about? It’s like if Nero just said one day, ‘you know. Burning cities is just – man. There’s no thrill in it anymore.’”

Jared laughs loudly at that. In part because Eric – as Bruce points out again – is making literally _no sense_. In part because now Bruce and Eric are arguing over whether Nero burned cities or just watched them burn. But he lets his eyes move across the room to where Jensen is still sitting tense, playing cards. Mostly he’s laughing because Jensen is an idiot.

“Jen!” Jared bellows across the room. “Come help me switch out the kegerator!” Jensen looks up surprised, but stands up and follows Jared into the kitchen.

“Did we really go through that much beer?” Jensen mutters as he starts to open the device.

“No but you’ve been as asshole all day. So I decided that tonight you have to give me a massage to make up for it.”

Jensen looks startled and locks eyes with Jared. He swipes his tongue across his lower lip and huffs out a sharp breath.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “I can do that.”

“A long one,” Jared whispers. “You should plan to stay in my room tonight.” It’s the first time they make a plan to spend the night together.

“I can do that too.”

“Good.” Jared says simply, his voice rough.

He walks out of the kitchen and Jensen follows. When they split off, Jared watches him walk and can see the tension bleed out of his body.

Soon the group dwindles even further, and Eric and Bruce are the last two standing, waiting for cars they just ordered to come pick them up.

“So you guys really aren’t going to see each other until Christmas?” Bruce calls out and Jared laughs.

“No, we’re just not spending Thanksgiving together! We’ll get together – what do you think, Jen? That weekend?”

Jensen laughs and agrees, but the relief in his voice is something only Jared can hear. Jared is taken aback by how many assumptions Jensen had clearly been making and how much they were bothering him.

Jared has always known Jensen is less comfortable expressing emotion than he is, and that has always carried the assumption that Jared was more emotional than Jensen. But then he thinks about how all he has ever really had to do is ask for something and Jensen will give it to him, and how much Jensen takes responsibility for making sure Jared is comfortable in any given situation, and how freaked out Jensen had been the morning after their first time together. And for the first time, Jared considers the possibility that expressing emotion and being guided by it are very different things.

And that’s why Jared doubles down and extends an invitation to both of them to Vail in January if they feel like snowboarding. “Besides, the hot tub in our room is sick. Right, Jen?”

Everyone had enough to drink that the use of the term “our” to describe the room wouldn’t be noticed by anyone but Jensen. But the look they share when Jared says it lets him know Jensen _definitely_ noticed.

It’s the closest they come to talking about it, but it works. After that, they don’t bother with a cover story to spend the night together anymore. 


	7. More Invasion of Normandy, Less Bay of Pigs

The week of Thanksgiving, Jensen arrives home on Sunday, and Jared arrives home on Monday. The plan is to spend the week with their respective family and friends and then get together at Texas Stadium – which they both had long ago sworn to love more than the soon-to-be-completed Cowboys Stadium – for the game on Sunday. It would be the first time they see each other for a week. It would also be in public, an idea that seems to contain an unspoken challenge. If after a week apart, their first get together would be in a public place, it would force them to either admit that they needed a private reunion or admit that whatever this thing was had run its course. After the game, they would stay in Irving for the night for an after-party. 

That’s the plan anyway. 

“This was a terrible plan,” Jared whines over the phone to Jensen Thanksgiving evening at 7:30pm when, after they annoyed everyone in their families with the incessant typing back and forth, even they finally got sick of texting every two minutes, admitted defeat, and retreated to their bedrooms for a proper phone call. 

“It was _your_ plan,” Jensen reminds Jared, though now that he thinks about it he can’t really remember if that’s true. 

“It was idiotic,” Jared declares. “We need a new plan. A better plan.”

“And what’s our better plan?” 

“I’m formulating. So far it consists of deriding the original plan.” 

“OK, but deriding the original plan is not a plan.” 

“It’s not the invasion of Normandy, I’ll grant, but it’s still a step up from the current plan. Mostly because anything is a step up from the current plan.” 

“ _Anything_? Dude, you’re saying communism is a better plan than us not seeing each other until Sunday? Wile E. Coyote’s exploding birdseed? Bay of Pigs?” 

Jared laughs loudly at that and Jensen lets himself enjoy the warm swell in his chest that comes from hearing his voice. 

Jared clears his throat. “I honestly don’t remember my point.” 

“Your point is, we need a new plan.” 

“Right,” Jared agrees heartily. “More invasion of Normandy, less Bay of Pigs.” It’s Jensen’s turn to laugh, and Jared speaks so quietly, Jensen almost misses it. 

“I miss you,” Jared offers and is rewarded with a soft chuckle from Jensen that warms him thoroughly and makes his stomach swoop just a little. 

 _I missed you as soon as I got on the plane_ , Jensen thinks fondly, but the words get caught in his throat and somehow they come out, “yeah.” 

Jensen can almost hear Jared smiling. “Are you alone?” Jared asks. 

“Yeah,” Jensen is surprised at how soft his voice comes out. “But everyone’s downstairs…why?” 

“Why do you think?” Jared’s voice is rough and low and Jensen is kind of embarrassed when he realizes how much he has memorized that tone and started to associate it with all his favorite things in life. 

“Can you be quiet?” Jensen walks over to his door and turns the lock, suddenly aware of how _silent_ everything is, and tries to find something to use for white noise. 

“I’m _always_ quiet,” Jared argues with a laugh. 

“You’re – you’re kidding right? You are hands down the loudest person I know. Even stuff that shouldn’t be loud, you manage to add noise,” Jensen returns, relying on the easy banter to calm his nerves as he contemplates having phone sex with his best friend. “You text me loud. I swear, I always know when it’s you texting me because it’s like you have some magical ability to make the phone vibrate louder.” 

“Well you get dressed loud. I’ve never heard one person make that much noise getting ready.” 

“You pack loud.” 

“How the hell can someone pack loud?” Jared laughs. 

“I don’t know, Jared, you tell me. _How the hell can someone pack loud_? But you open every suitcase, every closet door…I swear you run from room to room. And in the end forget half your shit anyway and have to borrow my shampoo.” 

“I don’t really forget my shampoo, I just like yours better.” 

“I knew it!” Jensen exclaims triumphantly and laughs as Jared joins in. When they finish laughing they both are out of breath and Jensen takes that moment to continue. “You breathe loud.” 

“Nah, just when you make me breathe hard,” Jared drawls and Jensen sucks in a sharp breath. 

They’re both quiet for a minute, and Jensen considers buying himself a little more time with the comfortable banter, but instead he just decides to rush in. 

“What are you wearing?” 

“Way too cliché, Jen.” Jared sounds nervous and, like clockwork, Jensen relaxes and focuses on calming Jared down. 

“Tell me anyway,” Jensen shrugs 

“Um, jeans and my Longhorns shirt.” 

“Sexy.” 

A short laugh. “Yeah.” 

“No, for real. It is. I – I like that I know all your clothes well enough that asking you what you’re wearing – it’s not really a cliché with us.” 

Jared considers this with a smile and feels the tension melt out of his body. He relaxes against his bed, leaving space for where Jensen would lay next to him if he were there. “What are you wearing?” 

“Warm-up pants and your hoodie.” Jensen smiles. “My mom keeps it freezing in the house – you’ll feel right at home – so I have your hoodie on over my black Calvin Klein shirt.” 

“I’ll let you keep the hoodie if you take it off now,” Jared bargains and Jensen smiles. 

“OK. I can do that.” A whisper of clothes and Jensen pulls off the hoodie and his t-shirt. “OK, now you.” 

“What – um – what should I take off?” 

“Just your shirt. You can keep the jeans for now.” Jensen looks around his room again searching for something to turn on so he feels slightly more comfortable even though the rest of the family is downstairs and engrossed in a movie. He settles on the television and winces as it comes on too loud. 

“Did you just turn on the news?” Jared asked amused. 

“I just want some kind of background noise,” Jensen explains. 

“Because you’re loud!” Jared cackles and Jensen imagines him throwing his arms up in victory. 

“Because I want to tell you everything I want to do to you without worrying about people hearing me.” It comes out in one breath and for a moment while Jared is quiet Jensen starts to get nervous that Jared is going to laugh at his desperation. But the next sound that comes from Jared is not a laugh. His groan is low and Jensen feels his body react to it immediately. 

“How do you want to start?” 

“I want to touch you, Jared.” 

“Yeah, me too. I – I want – ” Jared falters and he exhales frustrated. “Sorry, I just – ” 

“J, it’s fine. It’s just us.” Jensen lies on his back and listens to Jared’s breathing stabilize. “If you want we can just talk about something else. Anything else.” Jensen bites back his disappointment and presses the heel of his hand against his now hardened cock, preparing himself to change the subject and hiding his frustration. 

“Why are you always trying to take care of me?” Jared asks in a voice that indicates he doesn’t actually want to stop, so Jensen tries again. 

“Because I like taking care of you. You like it too.” Jensen pitches his voice low. 

“Yeah, I do.” 

“You liked it the night after we filmed the scene in the warehouse when you had to spend like an hour on your knees, and so I promised I’d spend just as long on mine.” 

Jared gasps in surprise at how explicit Jensen is, admitting to what he’d said that night when at the time he’d needed the cover of a few drinks to be that forward. It relaxes Jared and he runs his hands down his stomach, quickly unbuttoning his pants and reaching to stroke his cock, biting his lip when the pleasure takes him by surprise.  

“Yeah, you took care of me really good that night, huh?” Jared’s breath catches. “Fuck, Jen you give – you give the best head,” Jared clearly sounds less nervous and Jensen feels emboldened by that. 

“No, you do,” Jensen insists. “The – I still think about the first time you went down on me. In LA? I thought about it yesterday in the shower. The first time I felt your tongue on me I thought I’d come in your mouth right then.” Jensen moans at the memory, the sudden surprise quickly replaced by incredible pleasure and then panic as he tried to hold back so it would last longer. The disbelief that Jared’s _mouth_ was wrapped around his cock and he was moaning like Jensen was actually the best thing he’d ever tasted – like he was exactly what Jared wanted in his mouth at that moment. He begins stroking himself at the memory and is grateful for the television in the background because he is surprised at how loud he allows his whimpers to become. 

They don’t talk for a few minutes, instead relying on grunts and gasps to communicate what they are still hesitant to say out loud. But as they get closer, inhibitions are lowered and desperation beats out embarrassment and forces them to speak again in broken voices, thick with arousal. 

“Fuck, Jen, I need to taste... I – I came two nights ago thinking about it. I miss having you…in my mouth.” The end of Jared’s sentence is almost inaudible, swallowed by a combination of embarrassment and pure lust. But Jensen knows what he’s saying and his hips buck in agreement. 

“I’ll give you anything you want. As much as you want, if you just – Jared, I need you to – please I need – ” 

“Yeah, Jensen, please give it to me. I’ll suck you as long as you need. I’ll make it so good for you if I can just – I actually need to - ”

“What, J? What do you need?” 

“I need to taste you – I need you to come in my mouth.” Jared says it like he’s admitting something secret, a whispered voice that breaks as he says it, turning into a groan as he lets himself come. And that’s what pushes Jensen over the edge – hearing Jared admit that, and when Jensen comes he groans out, “fuck, yes, I will. Open your mouth I’ll come right _there_.” They are both gasping by the time he finishes and they lay in silence for a moment, catching their breath and wrapping their heads around what they had just done. 

Finally, Jared gives a sheepish laugh. “This _was_ a better plan.” 

After that, they don’t bother with a pretense that they’ll spend many days apart. They pass themselves back and forth between each others’ parents’ homes with easy familiarity the way high school kids do, careful not to overstay their welcome with either family, but equally careful to plan as many sleepovers as good manners and passable excuses will allow. 

Two beers becomes more than enough to beg off driving home, and since they’re outside of LA and Vancouver no one even suggests a cab. Instead, guest rooms are made up, and they are careful to make sure that in the morning they look like they’ve been slept in. 

Vague references to other siblings having “friends in town” allow them to spend nights together in the name of hospitality, and the slightest hint of winter weather is justification for hunkering down for the night and trying again in the morning. 

Their notoriously close relationship helps them out and insulates them from more prying questions by reminding people “this is just _them_ ”; they have always spent so much time together that history becomes their best cover story. 

Christmas is perfect in that it’s completely uneventful. The families mix easily, most of them having met before. For the two days they all spend in the same house, Jared and Jensen barely have to try to end up rooming together. The Ackles agree to host since their home is best suited for it, and the guest room is immediately assigned to the Padaleckis. Jensen’s mom gives up her sewing room to Jared’s brother Jeff and his fiancée. Jensen’s sister McKenzie immediately offers to share her room with Jared’s sister Megan, who are conveniently only a year apart in age. Jensen quickly dismisses that idea and offers Megan his room, volunteering himself and Jared to share the basement. They refuse to hear arguments as they grab their stuff and haul it downstairs, daring to venture a couple of sly looks to each other as they silently marvel over how well it worked out. 

They become skilled at keeping quiet over those next couple of days, making use of early mornings and late nights and even once while everyone is busy cooking together, they fake a phone call from Eric, saying he needs to talk with them about the strike. Instead the use the opportunity to take turns giving each other impressively silent blowjobs up against the door in case anyone came down to check on them. 

The night before they leave for Vail, they lounge on the couch in Jensen’s family’s living room, their legs stretched out sharing an ottoman in front of them. Since the Padaleckis had returned home, there was no reason for them to share a room, so they stay up late, waiting out Jensen’s parents who should be heading to bed soon, so they can sneak into bed together. 

“Are you packed?” Jensen asks with a small smile. 

“Didn’t you hear me?” Jared returns. “I thought I ‘pack loud.’” They both smile at the memory but say nothing. Instead they sit in comfortable silence, getting tired, but neither prepared to admit defeat and go to bed alone. Instead they sit there, slowly drifting to sleep but refusing to move. When Jensen’s parents finally do head to bed, the boys are fast asleep on the couch, their ankles touching on the ottoman. Jensen’s mom covers them with a throw that was draped over the couch and smiles. 

Alan starts to wake them. 

“Alan, leave them,” Donna chastises him as she pulls him away. 

“Donna they can’t possibly sleep like that. Look at them. Besides as tall as they both are, they’re not going to be able to – ” 

Donna shushes him and drags him upstairs. As she looks back over her shoulder she whispers, “I don’t know. They seem like they’re really comfortable.”


	8. This Could Go Either Way

“Are you seeing this?” Jensen walks out into the bedroom from the bathroom wearing a towel around his waist and nothing else, staring intently at his phone. As Jared looks up, he quirks his mouth up into a little smile.

“I am,” Jared deadpans and continues to watch as Jensen walks across the room toward the bed.   

Jensen huffs out a small laugh, but doesn’t look up from his phone, forcing Jared to roll his eyes, abandon the fireplace where he’s trying to start a fire and walk over to see what Jensen is staring at so intently.

When Jared leans over Jensen’s shoulder, a little too close than would be strictly necessary to see the phone, Jensen automatically shifts his head slightly up and lets his lips graze Jared’s neck. He flushes slightly, and Jared smiles, feeling like Jensen has finally paid him sufficient attention. Satisfied, he focuses on the email that has Jensen so concerned.

Jared lets out a laugh when he sees that Chad’s Evite to _their_ New Year’s party now has 980 guests attending. The original plan of having a handful of friends descend upon their cabin for New Year’s Eve had officially morphed into an over-the-top party that Chad insisted should have 2008 guests.

“Get it? _2008_! You get it?” he’d slurred over Jaeger bombs when he’d suggested the guest count, elbowing Jensen in the ribs annoyingly until Jared had smacked him on the arm and rolled his eyes. They’d taken a detour and met up with him in Austin on their drive up to Colorado to pitch him the plan for New Years.

“No, Chad, he doesn’t get it because the beauty of _your_ humor is in its subtlety.” Jared deadpanned.

Chad had pouted for exactly 20 seconds until the next round of drinks had been brought over.

“OK, so who do you want there?” Chad had looked at them expectantly and rolled his eyes at their blank returning stares. “ _Girls_. What girls do you want me to invite? Christ, it’s like teaching sex as a second language.”

“Fuck you,” Jensen had murmured as he prepared to plunk his shot of Jaeger into the pint glass in front of him.

“Fuck me,” Chad intoned. “Fuck _you_!” He let out a laugh. “Either you’re fucking someone and doing a hell of a job keeping it a secret or you’ve gone monk. Since Danneel – and I still have no clue what the fuck happened there, by the way – I haven’t seen you with anyone! Either of you actually! And that’s not weird for Jared,” Chad paused to gesture toward Jared with his hand still holding a beer and sloshing half of his drink onto the table. “Jared’s always single – until he’s not.” It had been one of those sentences that simultaneously meant everything and nothing. On one hand, it was nonsensical: _everyone_ is single until they’re not. But it was also weirdly and specifically descriptive of Jared in a way that made Jensen catch his breath for a moment. Jared _was_ always single until he wasn’t. He didn’t date. He hooked up, but even that was rare considering how often he _could_. Instead, he’d meet women, hang out, and then – suddenly – be in a serious relationship.

For the first time since he and Jared started _whatever this thing was_ that at some point, Jared wouldn’t be single anymore. And the question that gnawed at him that he couldn’t ignore in that moment was, when that happened, what would happen to them? Jensen let out a breath through his nose, terrified to let on to either guy that he’d been holding it at all.

Fortunately for Jensen, Chad was paying no attention to him, instead continuing with his rant. “But you, Jensen. You _always_ have some girl as at least a possibility! You’ve gotta have your eye on someone. Who is it?”

“Chad,” Jensen had looked at him seriously for a moment, green eyes glinting as he broke into a grin. “You’re a fucking moron.” He waited to hear a similar dismissal from Jared, and when nothing came he looked up confused at Jared’s tight jaw and questioning eyes. 

Puzzled, Jensen continued. “You’re not my fucking pimp, man.”

Chad grinned, “I’m definitely a fucking pimp, man!” That got both Jared and Jensen and they laughed loudly, breaking the tension that seemed to be coming off of Jared that Jensen couldn’t place.

“We don’t need you to invite anyone for us. We’re good, right J?” Jensen trained his eyes on Jared, and Jared gave a slight nod and smiled.

“We’re good.”

Chad had seemed satisfied – or at least drunk – so instead of pressing the issue he shrugged. “Drink up, bitches!” He’d bellowed loudly earning cheers from the crowded bar and did an impressive job chugging his drink, which Jensen appreciated because it gave him enough time to sneak his hand under the table and squeezed Jared’s knee. Jared and laughed and nearly choked on his own drink, grabbing Jensen’s hand and holding it to keep it still. Jensen’s hand went completely still, but Jared hadn’t let go, so Jensen curled his fingers up and intertwined them with Jared’s. They had stayed like that for about a minute. It had been quick. But it had also been the first time they’d held hands.

That had been five days ago. Now it was the day before New Years’ Eve, they had spent the entire day on a mountain doing more falling than actual snowboarding, and Jensen had just taken his turn in a long soothing shower. Jared was supposed to start a fire and they planned to spend the evening stretched out in the hot tub in their room drinking the bottle of scotch Jensen’s dad had given Jared for Christmas and mentally preparing for a party. Instead, they are both gaping at Jensen’s email and the knowledge of the small army of people who would be showing up for a party the next day.

“How the hell did he invite _this_ many people _this_ quickly?” Jensen marvels.

“There might not actually even be an Internet. It’s just a theory at this stage, but I honestly think it’s just as likely that it’s just Chad telling people shit.”

“I don’t even – but – he’s an ass. I mean, not like – but he is. How does he even know this many people who like him?” Jensen seems genuinely perplexed.   
  
“We like him,” Jared reminds Jensen with a smile.

“Well, we clearly can’t have it here,” Jensen concludes shaking his head.

“The bar downstairs,” Jared agrees, tapping out an email on his own phone. The lodge is connected to several restaurants and a couple of bars, one that could accommodate a large party. Jared emails his publicist immediately to ask him to figure out the logistics of booking the space and, despite it being the day before New Years’ Eve, he’s quickly informed that they can use the space for a private party once his publicist assures the management that it will be a star-studded affair.

Jared looks up and Jensen has already slid into the hot tub, so Jared pulls off his sweatpants and does the same. They settle into a moment of awkwardness that always accompanies times like this.

They’re good in explicitly sexual situations – at this point they’re _great_ – in explicitly sexual situations. And they’re equally comfortable in the boundary-free closeness where they’ve been their entire friendship.

But it was situations like this – when they’re both naked in a hot tub, but not hooking up, or when they wake up first thing in the morning, still warm from sleep and pressed together, reaching instinctively to cuddle in a way that is decidedly romantic but not sexual, or some moments when one of them says something funny or suggests the perfect movie and they reach for each other to kiss instead of fist bump – that still throw them off.

In those moments, an invisible switch pushes them from completely effortless to confusing because in those moments it’s impossible to ignore how much it’s just like it’s always been between them except…not. And in those moments – those _this could go either way_ moments, there lies an awkwardness that was quickly becoming so familiar that, if they squinted, they could almost mistake it for comfort.

Jared speaks first with a sheepish smile. “I couldn’t start the fire,” he admits.

Jensen gives a low laugh and pulls him close. “I’ll keep you warm,” he teases archly.

Jared lets himself be pulled in and lets Jensen wrap his arms around him. He snakes a long arm out of the tub to reach the two glasses of scotch Jensen had poured before sinking into the hot tub. He hands one to Jensen, keeps one for himself, and relaxes swallowing a huge mouthful.

“So 980 people? How many of those are girls Chad’s going to spend the night trying to set you up with?” Jared keeps his eyes straight ahead as he speaks.

Jensen eyes Jared carefully and notices that he’s tense and while he tries to keep his voice light, there’s an edge to it. “Chad is going to spend the night trying to keep his fiancée away from every other girl there. He’ll leave me alone, I promise.”

Jared hums softly a noncommittal agreement but says nothing for a moment. “Well, you’ll need someone to kiss at midnight,” Jared teases. “It’s not like you can kiss me.”

Jensen rubs Jared’s arms quickly and stands up unceremoniously. He drips water across the floor as he grabs a robe and runs out to the living room with Jared laughing and calling behind him.

“What the hell are you doing, Jen?” Jared yells.

Jensen comes back grinning carrying a bottle of champagne and his guitar.

“The champagne is for tomorrow,” Jared chastises.

“Who says?” Jensen reasons and pops the cork, letting it fizz and run over his fingers, holding it to his mouth and taking a huge gulp. He leans over and holds it to Jared’s lips and Jared swallows as well.

“OK, so tomorrow, we’re celebrating New Years with every person from ages 21 to 33 in this country apparently. So tonight, is going to be our New Years party. Just us. So we have champagne and – ” Jensen picks up his guitar and strums a few notes. Slowly he begins to play and sing softly.

 _“Maybe it’s much too early in the game. Oh, but I thought I’d ask you just the same. What are you doing New Years’? New Years’ Eve?_ ” He locks eyes with Jared and smiles and Jared grins back at him happily, closing his eyes and sipping more champagne out of the bottle. When Jensen finishes, he looks embarrassed and gives a small almost imperceptible shrug. Jared’s smile back is wide, and he gestures for Jensen to get back in the tub.

“What about my kiss?” Jared asks, clearly a little tipsy, but also clearly mostly sober.

Jensen climbs back into the tub and this time, it’s not awkward at all.

***************************************************************************************************************************************

The party gets out of hand before it really even starts, which is the sign of the best or the worst nights, depending on who you’re asking.

Even with the bar accommodating them at the last minute, the group is huge enough that it spills out onto the deck, and staff scrambles to put out enough heat lamps to keep the group reasonably warm in the cold January air. However, the combination of alcohol and the sea of warm bodies is even more effective at keeping everyone warm than the lamps spread out across the outdoor space. Jensen actually even finds himself feeling hot as he wonders away from the crowd to cool off.

So many friends made the trip out, and before long he stumbles upon Chris and Tom chatting animatedly under a heat lamp.

“Where’s your other half?” Tom asks immediately. “We need to fix this heat lamp and I need another set of hands. He’ll be able to reach.”

“He’s around here somewhere,” Jensen responds gesturing back towards the party. “Why don’t you just stand under another heat lamp?”  
  
That particular fix hadn’t occurred to them, so they walk a little farther and find a working heat lamp before continuing the conversation.

“Have you heard from Kripke?” Tom asks.

Jensen shakes his head. “Writer’s strike?”  
  
“No, about this show. Some, um, some shows are starting to hear.” Tom shrugs guiltily, silently blaming the alcohol for muting the part of his brain that knew better than to ask something like that.

“It’s cool, man,” Jensen allows easily. “Hey, congrats, seriously, that’s great news.” It’s a muted response, but no one was surprised to hear that Smallvile was being renewed, so a bigger display really wasn’t necessary.

“Not everyone’s heard yet,” Tom continues and regrets the words as soon as they come out of his mouth because _fuck_ _could he sound anymore condescending_. Jensen is a good sport though and smiles at Tom, letting him off the hook. Tom takes the invitation and changes the subject swiftly.

Jensen tries to force his mind to shut out thinking about the show, but it’s impossible. They hadn’t heard anything, which probably meant…He wants to talk to Jared, but he doesn’t want to ruin his night, so he promises himself he’ll keep quiet about the show. Besides, the show getting cancelled raises whole new questions for them now, and Jensen really doesn’t have the energy to go there tonight.

Soon Jared ambles over to the group carrying a red plastic cup, which Jensen takes as soon as he’s within reach and downs.

“What the fuck is that?” Jensen sputters and tries to spit out the vile concoction he’d unfortunately already swallowed.

“Fuck, I don’t know. Malibu and something.”

Jensen looks giddy. “Malibu!” He exclaims happily as though finding something new to tease Jared about had been his only New Years’ Resolution and now he’d get to take it easy for the rest of the year. “Since when do you drink Malibu?”

“I don’t know,” Jared hangs his head embarrassed and gave a chuckle. “This girl made it for me, so I took it. I didn’t – ”

“Who?” Jensen responds immediately and winces when he realizes that he interrupted Jared to ask about the girl, betraying how shocked he was to hear there _was_ a girl.

“No – I don’t know,” Jared looks at Jensen a little wide eyed and shook his head. “I don’t know at all. She just – was at the bar, and was talking to me, and handed me this drink.”

“Was she cute?” Jensen grins at Jared, and notices that Jared’s face falls – just for a second – before he schools it into a smile and shrugs.

The conversation continues, but Jensen doesn’t pay any attention. He is too busy willing his heart to slow down ever since he heard Jared mention a girl. It wasn’t fair – his reaction – because it’s not like they had ever had a conversation about exclusivity. Mostly because that would necessitate a conversation about what exactly they were doing, which they’d so far managed to avoid, much to Jensen’s unending relief.

Jared could flirt with whomever he wanted and, in fact, he _should_. If the conversation from the other day with Chad had taught Jensen anything it’s that both of their lack of interest in dating is starting to raise suspicion. A little flirting now and then was good. It would help them keep their secret.

Then as if Jensen remembering their conversation summons him, Chad walks up out of nowhere. He pulls Jared into a hug and looks at him seriously.

Chad throws his other arm around Jensen and pulls him close, the three of them smushed together, allowing Jensen and Jared to place arms around each other’s waists and camouflage it as humoring Chad. “I couldn’t get 2008 people here, man,” he shakes his head sadly like he’s apologizing to them for something they wanted instead of something Chad forced on them.

“You know what? Don’t worry about it. This is perfect,” Jared responds with a smile looking right at Jensen.

By 11:30, the party has taken over both bars and the outdoor space, transforming almost the entire lodge into one giant celebration.

Jensen has found countless excuses not to let Jared out of his sight, despite his earlier insistence to himself that a little flirting with other people would help them keep their cover. Instead, he sticks close by Jared, allowing a drunk Jared to get more and more physical and occasionally allowing himself to return that attention in less than appropriate ways.

“I wish I could kiss you at midnight,” Jensen whispers in Jared’s ear when a loud song buys them the opportunity to lean close to each other in order to be heard.

“You kissed me last night,” Jared reminds him with a smile. Then, feeling particularly bold thanks to way too many drinks and the anonymity that comes from huge crowds. “I wish I could fuck you at midnight.”

Jared grins when he hears Jensen breathe in sharply. “The good thing about this many people? No one expects to stay with us,” Jensen whispers slyly. It was true. When the party grew, everyone had booked rooms for the night, at this lodge or the ones next door, and so instead of opening their doors tonight to a number of friends, they would actually still have their room to themselves, at least for tonight.

“Let’s leave in an hour?” Jared breathed out.

Jensen’s voice was hoarse. “Yes.”

At that they separate, silently agreeing to make some final rounds so they can slip out soon with enough people having “just seen them” so it can be assumed that they “must be around here somewhere.”

Jensen joins Chad and Chris for a shot, and hangs back with Chad for a minute when Chris gets pulled off to dance with someone.

“This really was a better idea than your party,” Chad insists as he hands Jensen _another_ shot glass.

“Bigger, Chad. The word is bigger.”

Chad continues, not looking at Jensen. “No, ‘cause this way you guys get the place to yourself. So you can have your own New Years’.” Chad sounds weirdly sober, and Jensen turns to look at him in disbelief.

“He didn’t tell me or anything. Just – you guys haven’t exactly been subtle tonight. I managed to figure it out.”

Jensen opens his mouth and closes it a couple of times without any words coming out.

“It’s fine – it is what it is. It makes Danneel make more sense. It makes – it actually makes everything make more sense.”

Jensen is too drunk to even try to lie and too shocked to feel relief at Chad’s reaction. “You’re not an asshole.” Jensen can’t hide the surprise in his voice.

“Oh no I definitely am,” Chad admits. “Just not about shit like this.”

They raise their shot glasses and down their drinks and stand quietly before Chad speaks again.

“Just listen. I know Jared. I mean, I’ve known him longer than you – I know you know him _better_ , but I _have_ known him longer. And – what I said the other day? He really is single up until he’s not so. If you guys are just fucking around, cool. But if you care about him, don’t – he’s single and then _boom_. He’s not. You know?”

“Yeah,” Jensen says hollowly even though he’s way too drunk to follow Chad logic, but he has to say _something_ because it’s been too long since he has. But the wheels in his brain start churning slowly and he gets it. Jared is single until he’s not. And tonight some girl made him a Malibu and something. _Oh_.

“Just it’s – whatever.” Chad continues. “Just talk to him. Don’t count on the show to be the reason you _have_ to talk.”  
  
“The show’s getting cancelled.” Jensen says it with finality for the first time and Chad’s eyes go wide.

“Shit! Dude, I’m sorry. Fuck, when did you guys hear?”

Jensen shakes his head. “It’s a long story. And it’s not official, so don’t tell Jared, but. Yeah.” He finishes without really knowing what he’s saying.

“I’m sorry,” Chad repeats.

“Thanks.” Jensen is quiet for a minute. “But this is good because it means we’ll talk. Because we have to talk. Honestly, if the show had gotten renewed, we’d probably just keep putting it off, but now. We _have_ to talk. So – we will.”

“Good,” Chad nods. “Come on. The countdown started.”

***************************************************************************************************************************************

When Jensen wakes up, it’s 2008. Not much longer after the clock had struck 12, they had retreated to their room where Jensen had gotten on his hands and knees and let Jared fuck him hard and fast on the floor in their room. Jensen hadn’t come when Jared did, so Jared had taken him in his mouth and sucked him until Jensen came with a rough and broken moan, spilling into Jared’s mouth.

They’d fallen asleep soon after, and woken early with the beginnings of hangovers. Water, aspirin, and they had come back to bed, softly tracing patterns on each other’s skin.

This morning, Jensen rolls over and steels himself, mentally preparing to step outside of his nature and talk about what’s been going on between them. Only Jared isn’t in bed.

“ _J_!” Jensen calls and grimaces because he still has a hangover. Jared comes padding into the room with two cups of coffee and Jensen grins in thanks.

Jared beats him to the first word, and just as Jensen is about to suggest that they talk seriously, Jared grins.

“Krip called this morning. The strike ended. And we got renewed.”

Jensen is giddy with shock and happiness and relief, and even though somewhere in the back of his mind he knows this isn’t a good idea, he lets that feeling take over and pushes thoughts of hard conversations and confusing relationships away for another time. They’d have plenty of time to figure it out. They were going back to work.


	9. Katie’s Doing a Great Job

January ends and they return to Vancouver.

The rest of their vacation had passed by in a blur of a near-constant stream of visitors at the cabin, a lot of late nights, more stolen moments, and even a few close calls. When Jared’s sister came to visit for her birthday, the next morning found the boys asleep in the same bed, tangled up together, not realizing she planned to go for an early morning run. Their sleep-addled brains were too slow to simply blame it on the fact that they had been drunk and had accidentally collapsed in the same bed. Instead, Jared had shrugged and said he’d gotten cold in the middle of the night and Jensen was there. It truly was a testament to Jared’s inability to locate even a hint of a boundary that Megan hadn’t been even remotely suspicious. Instead she simply rolled her eyes sympathetically with Jensen, grabbed a water bottle, and headed out for her run.

They extended the open invitation for friends to come and see them before they headed back to work far and wide, urged as many friends as possible to make the trip, sacrificing the personal time they had so jealously guarded now that they knew they’d have more – as much as the wanted – in Vancouver.

Their first day back on set Jensen notices the entire atmosphere has transformed from what he remembered before hiatus. With the stress of their uncertain future gone, a general easiness surrounds production. Not only do they no longer have to contend with a looming threat of strike, they know they’re coming back for another season earlier than they ever have before. While it can’t do much for their decision-making around season three so late in the game, the writers are constantly huddling, cooking up new ideas for a season no one knew for sure they’d have and now no one can wait to start work on.

That’s why Jensen isn’t remotely surprised when Eric comes up to him and Jared at the end of shooting that first day and asks if they’d stay a little later for a meeting.

“Sorry, fellas,” Eric shrugs apologetically. “It’s a long day, and I know all you want to do is head home, but it would be great if we could just get thirty? You can go home right after – in fact, the show will even buy you guys a couple of steaks. Gotham?”

Jensen rolls his eyes because Jared’s face lights up immediately. It’s a cheap trick they learned midway through first season. Jared might as well be a college student as opposed to a millionaire for how easy it is to manipulate him with the promise of free food. One time after Jared had agreed on both of their behalf to come to set two hours early to record DVD commentary after someone had offered to have the show pay for dinner at Black and Blue, Jensen had tried to explain the ridiculousness as they rode to set way too early.

“You realize you could buy your own dinner, right? This is you saving us – what? Fifty bucks, tops?”

“It’s the principle!” Jared had argued back sulking because Jensen was withholding his coffee while he continued his lecture.

“What the hell principle is involved here?”

“It’s nice. Someone buying you dinner – it’s just nice. Even when you can afford it yourself, and it’s not that big of a deal. It’s a _gesture,_ Jensen. It’s one of the nicest things someone can do.” He’d closed his eyes in fatigue, but Jensen remembered thinking he looked almost…dreamy, like he really _meant_ it. Like, buying him dinner really was meaningful and kind in some way that was very specifically _Jared_.

Jensen had handed Jared his coffee and let it go. But from then on, when Jared had a bad day on set, or a particularly good day, or Jensen just wanted to do something nice for him, he got into the habit of offering to take him out to dinner.

In any event, as soon as the words leave Eric’s mouth, the damage is done, and Jared is fantasizing about the spiced mushrooms and onions, so Jensen doesn’t bother to argue. Eric calls his assistant to make them a reservation on the network account and pulls them in to the meeting.

“So listen,” Eric begins. “We need to start auditioning girls.” 

“Cool. New character?” Jensen rubs his hands together excitedly anxious to get any new details on what would be happening in the new season.

“Not strictly speaking, no. We’re going to switch things up with Ruby in the new season. Have her get another vessel.”

Jared looks up surprised. “But – Katie’s doing a good job.”

“Katie’s doing a _great_ job,” Eric emphasizes immediately. “It’s not her. It’s not that. It’s – we’re going to beef up the role in season four. It’s a long story, and we’ll hammer out the details soon but for now suffice to say, Ruby is going to play a bigger role in Sam’s adjustment to Dean going to hell. And she’s going to be a love interest for Sam.”

Jared grins cockily over at Jensen. Given the rarity that the show introduces – and keeps – female characters, they have a running competition to see whether Sam or Dean gets more onscreen action. While Jensen smiles back, he hates that he has to bite back a flare of something he doesn’t want to admit is jealousy at the idea of Sam making out onscreen with some woman.

Jensen pushes back against whatever he’s feeling and forces himself to stay in the moment. “OK, but again. Why can’t we go with Katie if she’s been doing a good job?”

“Katie’s doing a _great_ job,” Eric repeats and off Jensen’s looks sighs. “Listen. She’s fantastic, but she and Jared have no chemistry.”

Jared shrugs. “We have chemistry! I mean, we haven’t been asked to _have_ chemistry, but if you needed us to have chemistry we could.”

Eric shakes his head. “This isn’t – ”

Jared rushes on. “I just think she’s a great girl. I don’t want to see her lose a job because I haven’t been – ”

“It’s not you, Jared. It’s – well, actually if you want to know the truth it’s both of you. It’s _your_ chemistry. Your onscreen chemistry is so strong that it washes out the relationships you’ve had with women. Which has been fine so far because none of the women we’ve put you with have needed to last, but this is going to be a longer arc – possibly all season. We need someone who can have chemistry with you that can rival your chemistry with each other.”

Jensen almost laughs at how perfect a description it is of them.

“So we’re going to start auditioning girls end of this week, and hopefully bring some in for a couple of chemistry reads. First with both of you, and then with you, Jared.”

“Sounds good,” Jared shrugs, looking at Jensen curiously and a little tense.

“Yeah, that works. Just let us know when you need us. Oh, and don’t forget we have the con in a couple of weeks in LA.” Jensen nods reassuringly at Jared who immediately relaxes.

“Shit, yeah, I forgot,” Eric checks his calendar. “OK, yeah, we may need to rearrange some stuff.”

They spend a little more time coordinating schedules, figuring out when they’ll be in town and when they can have bring actresses in to read.

“OK, this is helpful. We’ll let you know as soon as we know more. Guys, thanks so much for sticking around. Go. Eat. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

Jared stands up immediately and claps Eric on the knee. “Thanks, Krip!” He calls as he starts out, Jensen mirroring the gesture and following him out.

They had let Cliff leave on time, so they call a car to get to the restaurant. They chat aimlessly and easily about being back and the shoot that day until they’ve been seated and ordered appetizers and drinks.

“So, that’s one more point for me,” Jared ventures, looking at Jensen carefully. “Sam’s getting a girlfriend.”

“Yeah, while I’m in hell!” Jensen jokes easily and smiles when he sees Jared relax. “You – unless they’re doing a flash forward, you’re getting laid while I’m getting tortured in hell.”

“Well, Dean can add it to the list of ways Sam is selfish – he went to college, he ran off with Meg, he fought with their dad before he died…” Sam ticks things off on his fingers and gives a small laugh. “Dean is better to Sam than Sam is to Dean.”

Jensen shrugs automatically. “He’s just the big brother. It’s not about better or worse. It’s just a different role.”

Jared nods slowly and then breaks out into a grin. “If I died and went to hell, would you get a girlfriend?”

Jensen answers before he has a chance to think. “Nah, I’d just hook up with some chick at the celebration party I’d have that same night.” He smiles widely at Jared who returns his smile, but immediately becomes preoccupied with his drink. As soon as Jensen thinks about it for a second, he realizes that Jared was hoping for a moment of seriousness.

Ever since the morning after New Years’, Jensen hasn’t even considered trying to force himself into a serious conversation about their relationship. Even so, as much as he didn’t want to invite a serious conversation, he also didn’t want to leave Jared hanging in a moment of insecurity.

Jensen grabs a spoon, fishes out half of the ice in his scotch and deposits it into Jared’s glass. “I don’t even want to think about it,” he says quietly. “But if you died and went to hell? I wouldn’t get a girlfriend.”

Jared gives a small smile, but it is clear that he’s touched even before he responds. “If you died and went to hell, I wouldn’t get out of bed.”

***************************************************************************************************************************************

When dinner ends, they head immediately back home, excited that a full day shooting, plus dinner out and a last minute meeting has still allowed them to get home before 11pm. Jared immediately goes to the kitchen to grab two beers as Jensen goes to grab his guitar so they can spend a little time just hanging out before heading to bed.

Instead he comes back with two shots of whiskey in addition to the beer. He downs his and urges Jensen to do the same. They’re already a couple drinks in after dinner, so they both are pretty buzzed when Jared says, “so, we never actually talked about it.”

Jensen looks up from where he’s tuning and turns questioning eyes on Jared.

“I’m getting a girlfriend.”

Jensen shrugs and lets the alcohol calm his nerves. He reaches out for Jared, who lets himself be pulled close. Instead of drawing him into a hug, Jensen pulls him so he’s sitting next to Jensen on the couch, his back to Jensen’s chest. “I’m not worried.”

“Not even a little?” Jared teases, clearly relieved that Jensen isn’t honestly concerned but letting his competitive nature win out. “I mean, we’re going to have to find someone I have _amazing_ chemistry with – ”

“Yeah, genius, but only because you already have _amazing_ chemistry with me.”

“It won’t bug you? Really?” Jared twists his head around and looks at Jensen seriously, a mix of hope that Jensen isn’t bothered and desire for him to show at least a little jealousy.

Jensen smiles. The fact that Jared is legitimately concerned goes a long way to alleviating Jensen’s lingering jealously. He’s left feeling a mix of flattery that Jared worried about this at all and possessiveness that takes over as he whispers roughly in Jared’s ear.

“Just don’t forget who you come home to.” Jensen nips at his neck and Jared loses his breath for a moment. Encouraged by the reaction, Jensen sets his guitar on the floor and continues his exploration of Jared’s neck, kissing, sucking, and softly biting his way down to the muscle of his upper shoulder.

“Don’t – _fuck_ – don’t leave marks,” Jared pleads softly and convincingly in a way that lets Jensen know he’d really be just fine with being marked and Jensen actually growls in response.

“I’ll leave marks wherever I want,” Jensen tells Jared matter-of-factly. “I should give you a hickey right _here_ and make you go back and explain to make-up that they have to cover it because you needed to be reminded that no matter what _Sam_ does, _you_ do not have a girlfriend.”

“ _Fuck_ , Jen,” Jared moans and moves his head, exposing more of his neck. “Do it. Fucking – you can do whatever you want.”

“What do _you_ want to do?” Jensen asks roughly and stands up, placing his hands on Jared’s shoulders to keep him sitting on the couch. His crotch is even with Jared’s face and without hesitating he reaches his hands up and undoes Jensen’s pants. 

“You want – ” Jared pulls Jensen’s cock and begins rubbing it and licks his lips subconsciously.

“I want to fuck your mouth.” Jensen holds his breath for just a second, immediately aware of the words when they come out of his mouth and self-conscious at how explicit he is being. After hearing Jared whimper and feeling assured there is no reason for him to be self-conscious, he continues.

Jensen allows Jared to take him into his mouth, sucking eagerly and letting Jensen push in deeper, swallowing around him and moaning with pleasure as Jensen slides his hands into Jared’s hair.

“I’m gonna come in your mouth tonight, and I’m gonna come in your mouth every single night after you make out with one of these girls. This will be how I’ll get the taste of them out of your mouth. That what you want to hear?”

Jared nodded frantically and Jensen is momentarily overtaken by how amazing it is that _that’s_ what Jared wanted to hear. That Jared so wants Jensen to want him, to get jealous and possessive and to mark him –

Suddenly Jensen is close. And he can’t seem to stop the words that come spilling out. “If I need to, I’ll take you in my trailer in between takes and make you suck me off. Remind you who you belong to. Fuck, I hope she likes tasting me on your tongue because I’m gonna make sure that’s exactly what you taste like every – fuck – J!” Everything came together in one crystallizing moment and the moment his orgasm rushed over him, everything he’d ever felt became immensely clear.

 _I love you_.

When Jensen comes down he’s breathing hard and Jared looks incredibly proud of himself and Jensen can only think the words “I love you” pulsing over and over again in his head, but he honestly can’t remember if he said them out loud or not.

Jared is hard, and Jensen starts to move down his body to return the favor, but Jared shakes his head. “I want to – are you up for it? Can I fuck you?”

Jensen nods quickly and Jared grins. “Jen – I’m gonna hold you to it, you know? What you said?”

Jensen’s heartbeat quickens and _fuck_ he did say it out loud. He’s forced to admit – to himself – that he meant it, and while he probably wouldn’t have said it like that, he doesn’t, strictly speaking, regret that Jared knows.

Suddenly Jensen’s mind is flooded with images of this actually being more official. Of not having to do shots to have a moment of honesty about a twinge of jealousy over a new love interest, but also of not having to be jealous of a new love interest. Of steak dinners being actual dates. Of not having to wonder what happens with Jared meets some girl. Of holding hands on the ride in to work while they run lines.

And that’s why he’s a little disappointed when Jared clarifies. “We’ve never hooked up at work before. I’m gonna hold you to what you said about taking me in your trailer…” Jared trails off as he pulls Jensen toward his bedroom and Jensen realizes with disappointment that, as it turns out, he’d only thought it.

 _I love you_. It had seemed so real. But apparently it had only been in his head.

 

 


	10. No One Told Dorothy When to Run

The first thought Jensen has when he meets Genevieve is _fuck you Chad_.

And that sucks because if it hadn’t been for Chad’s voice in his head, Jensen would be thrilled. Genevieve is clearly the front-runner for New Ruby – as Jensen and Jared had taken to calling her – even before she reads.

The previous nine days had brought a string of women to set, some for initial readings which the guys watched from Video Village – the area next to set that typically housed the directors where they could watch playback without having to be on set – some for callback chemistry reads with the guys, and even two for individual chemistry reads with Jared.

Jensen had been able to anticipate everyone’s elimination within a few minutes of meeting them. Some had vamped it up, seemingly reasoning that since the part was for a demon they should lay it on thick. But Ruby isn’t supposed to be Elvira in blue jeans, so the dark make-up and smoky eyes just feel forced, like they’re trying too hard in a way Ruby simply wouldn’t do.

Others had gone the opposite direction, opting instead to play Ruby as ethereal scary – complete with pastel sundresses, saccharin sweet smiles, and – at least one girl – honest to god pigtails. This approach banked on the payoff of any moments of evil reading as particularly creepy, which could definitely work, but less so on Supernatural where such an obvious misdirect would be spotted miles away.

But when he meets her, Jensen is struck that Genevieve doesn’t have to _try_ to be Ruby. She just is.

Jensen sizes her up, noting she has just enough spunk to undermine the girl-next-door quality that would make it hard to believe her as a demon, but that her innocence is organic enough that she doesn’t have to play it up. She’s natural and effortless in a way that makes the moments when Ruby is good seem genuine and the moments when she’s scary seem truly terrifying.

She mixes sexiness with mysteriousness in equal enough measure that the audience won’t know whether to fall for her along with Sam or distrust her along with Dean. She has a look that’s simply perfect for a demon, which Jensen has to admit is probably not completely a compliment, though he honestly means it as one. _It’s a shame she’s not being hired to play a bigger evil_ , Jensen thinks wistfully. _She’s pretty like the devil must be._

And all of that would be fine – hell, it would be great – if it weren’t for Chad. Because now all Jensen can think is that this girl who should be the answer to all their prayers about not having to sit through anymore unsuccessful and awkward chemistry reads is also exactly Jared’s type. So Jensen spends just as much time during that initial read studying Jared as he does watching Genevieve, determined to figure out if Jared is falling for her.

When she’s done, Jensen watches as Jared makes an excuse to go onto set to meet her, and he watches from the monitors as he goes into overgrown puppy mode and makes playful, overenthusiastic overtures that have her laughing and flirting with him back. Jensen sits down and feels sick.

The other night – the first night they’d been back shooting, the night they went to Gotham, the night Jensen will refer to with myriad different descriptors to avoid thinking _the night he thought he told Jared he loved him_ – Jensen hadn’t been able to sleep.

Instead, he had laid flat on his back, still feeling Jared inside of him and overthinking the events of the night. The problem wasn’t that he’d thought he’d told Jared he loved him; the problem was that he’d actually been OK with it. The problem was that despite his unwillingness to talk about it, or define it, or even, really, to think about it too hard himself, he’d fallen for Jared in much more serious way than he’d expected _and_ in a much more serious way than he suspected Jared had fallen for him.

Jensen had avoided talking about what was going on between them because that’s just how he is. Jensen has never been open with his thoughts or his feelings. But Jared always wanted to talk about everything that was on his mind, so, as Jensen reasoned, this clearly wasn’t anything serious or Jared would have made him talk about it by now. Jensen chewed his lip as he let that sink in and promised himself to get whatever he was feeling in check. Whatever happened – at the end of it – they’d still need to be _them_ , and that couldn’t happen if Jensen turned what was clearly supposed to be a fun and casual hook-up into something deeper and more confusing.

Jensen was staring so hard at the ceiling he hadn’t seen Jared turn over to look at him. When Jensen turned he was looking right into Jared’s eyes and soft smile.

“Hey,” Jared had said softly, pulling Jensen closer to him. “You’re thinking too much.”

“Well you don’t think enough, so it balances out,” Jensen had returned easily with a yawn.

“Get out of your head,” Jared had insisted. “Listen – Jen. It was – I liked it.”

Jensen had shaken his in confusion as Jared continued. “Everything you said tonight? How you got kind of – possessive of me?” Jared had shivered slightly and grinned. “It was really hot. I _really_ liked it, OK? So you don’t have to feel weird about it.”

Jensen blinked thinking what a weird feeling it is when the person that normally knows everything you’re thinking before you do gets it so wrong.

“Yeah,” Jensen had nodded, forcing a smile. “I thought maybe I went too far or something. Dude, I’m glad I didn’t freak you out or anything.”  
  
“Nah, I was way into it. Couldn’t you tell? Look, if there’s ever anything we do that I’m not into, I’d totally just tell you. It’s not like I have some aversion to talking about shit. I mean, come on. You know me.”

Jensen’s smile disappeared and he gave a nod. “Yeah, I do.” Jared had fallen asleep after that, spooning Jensen while Jensen just stared into the darkness for a few more hours before his mind finally took pity on him and shut down.

So now, standing in front of a monitor, watching Genevieve get into character and simply _kill it_ as Ruby, instead of being relieved, Jensen keeps remembering that whatever is going on between them isn’t serious and will have to end as soon as Jared meets someone else. And Jared may be single right now, but, as Chad had pointed out, all it takes is a moment and then _boom_. He won’t be.

*************************************************************************************************************************************************

Eric jogs up to Jensen as he walks toward his trailer.

“Hey! Jensen, wait up!” he calls. Jensen turns on his heel and smiles.

“What’s up?”

“So, Genevieve, right? Man, I think we got it. We’re going to have her do the chemistry read with you guys this afternoon and then come back tomorrow to read with Jared alone. If it works, I think we have our Ruby.”

“Yeah,” Jensen responds emptily.

“You don’t think so?” Eric looks nervous and Jensen has a momentary fantasy about saying no and letting that be it, but he can’t bring himself to screw with someone’s career simply because he was dumb enough to fall in love with his best friend.

“Yeah, no, she’s great. I think she’s – I think she’s the one.” Jensen can’t imagine he sounds very convincing so he nods a lot to make up for it and widens his eyes in a way he hopes screams _believe me, I’m not lying_. He thinks he probably looks pretty ridiculous and is momentarily horrified that he gets paid to do this for a living.

“OK, cool. So, this afternoon? We won’t need you guys for a couple hours so we can squeeze her in then. Tell Jared?”

Jensen nods and finishes his walk to his trailer where Jared is sleeping on his couch.

“Wake up,” Jensen calls and gives Jared a nudge. Jared pulls his head up, hair going all over the place. He grins when his face connects that it’s Jensen.

“You’re here,” he says sleepily.

“No, _you’re_ here. Dude, it’s my trailer,” Jensen laughs fondly at Jared and right then, he’s not concerned about Genevieve or Chad’s stupid predictions or their lack of definition because Jared’s _here_ and isn’t that all he really wants?

Jared shrugs and rolls himself over so he’s lying on his back looking up at Jensen.

Jensen takes off his jacket and tries to sound casual. “Hey they want us to do a chemistry read with Genevieve today. They’re – uh- they’re rushing her through because they think she could be it.”

Jared nods and Jensen tries to read his face for anything – excitement, desire, anticipation – instead, Jared just gives a smiles and reaches his long arms up to pull Jensen down on top of him on the couch.

“So you gonna make sure I taste like you?” Jared drawls nipping at Jensen’s neck. Jensen has realized over the past few days that Jared really _had_ been into it the other night, and he really did intend on holding Jensen to the heat of the moment promises he had made about dragging Jared into his trailer before chemistry reads.

He’d insisted on going down on Jensen before every chemistry read so far, each time reminding Jensen how he’d promised to make sure he’d taste like him before his scenes with these girls. None of the scenes they run feature a kiss between Sam and Ruby, so it’s just an inside joke between them, but it excites Jared so much each time, and Jensen is happy to oblige. 

This time he can’t stop himself from tensing up and Jared notices immediately.

“What’s wrong?” Jared asks, rolling Jensen off of him enough to sit up looking concerned.

“I’m just – I’m sore, I think.” Jensen shakes his head and Jared looks at him curiously.

“Do you want me to give you a massage?” Jared asks moving back into Jensen’s body with a small smile.

Jensen huffs out a small laugh. “Later? For now I’m just gonna hop in a quick shower and try to get some sleep? Just for a little while before they need me back on set. Is that – is that cool?”

“Yeah, sure,” Jared says hurriedly. “Of course, I didn’t mean – ”

“You can stay. I mean, obviously, you can stay.”

“I’ll – I’m gonna grab some food, man, it’s cool.”

It’s the only time in their friendship Jensen can remember feeling so uncomfortable, and it actually kind of hurts. He gets in the shower and hopes when he comes out Jared will just be sitting on his couch, playing PlayStation or ready to pounce on him. Instead, he comes back out to an empty couch. He lies down, but he doesn’t sleep.

“Cut!” Bob yells out and Jensen ad Jared break the hug they’d been holding each other in. “That’ll work,” Bob mutters.

Jensen immediately starts shuffling his feet and Jared responds by stepping on Jensen’s toes when they move. They lazily break into a makeshift game that is part “hot hands but with feet” and part “tag but with feet.”

“Check the gate!” Robert yells and Jorge responds quickly. “Gate’s good.”

“Good gate! Let’s move!” Robert herds the production team to set up the next shot.

“Alright fellas!” Bob calls to Jensen and Jared who continue their game, grinning at each other and managing to tune out everything going on around them. “Jesus can you two lovebirds stop playing footsies for a minute?” he bellows laughing, but Jensen’s head shoots straight up and his face flushes completely. He looks terrified.

“We’re not – we weren’t – ” Jensen begins stuttering visibly flustered, but Jared cuts him off.

“Fuck you, Bob!” Jared calls out good-naturedly. “What’s up?”

“Next scenes are Ellen and Jo. We won’t need you for a couple hours and Eric says you have a chemistry read?”

“Yep. We’re going now!” Jared throws and arm on Jensen’s shoulder and leads him toward their trailers. “What the hell was that?”

“I don’t know.” Jensen mutters quietly. “I just got nervous that – I don’t know.”

Jared stares at him for a long moment and then looks away. “Yeah,” he responds emptily.

Jensen walks toward his trailer, calling out that he’s going to change his shirt. But really he just wants a minute to himself. When he closes the door to his trailer, he takes a deep breath and makes a decision. He doesn’t want to feel like this anymore, and he decides that quickly that he doesn’t have to. All the anxiety, the insecurity, the confusion – it’s all stemming from the fear about what happens when Jared decides he wants to break up from a relationship they never acknowledged having. But as much as that’s the problem, Jensen realizes it’s also the solution. Because since they never talked about it, never defined it, it could just…end.

And he would end it. He would do that for Jared. So it didn’t have to get awkward, so they never had to have a conversation Jared clearly didn’t want to have since he’d never pushed for it, so they wouldn’t have to lose each other as friends. He would end it, so Jared wouldn’t have to. And he could date Genevieve – or whomever – without having to feel guilty about Jensen. They wouldn’t have to be exes, they could just stay _them_ , and this would just become something they used to do.

*************************************************************************************************************************************************

The shot being set up for Jo and Ellen is an outdoor shot, so they use the soundstage for Genevieve’s chemistry read. When she walks in, Jensen is paging through a script, but he stands as she enters and Jared hops up as well.

“Hey!” she greets them cheerfully. “It’s great to meet you,” she turns to Jensen, “and to see you again,” she says to Jared. “I’m a really big fan of the show.”

Jared eyes her up and down and snorts. “You can’t be a _really big_ fan of the show,” he says with a grin.

“Fine, I’m a short fan of the show. Happy?” She smiles back at him.

Jared wraps her in a big hug in response. She looks surprised but recovers quickly and gives a throaty laugh. She reaches out to Jensen who extends his hand.

“So. How exactly does this work?” Genevieve looks expectantly at them.

Jensen grabs her a chair as he explains. “Eric and some of the guys from the production team will be here soon. We’ll run through a scene together and see how it feels.”

“But until then, we get to grill you.” Jared grins at her and she smiles back.

“Uh-oh. I don’t think this ends well for me.”

Jared whips out a copy of her headshot from behind his back and starts laughing when she goes red.

“OK,” he begins with a loud laugh as he looks down at her resume. “Genevieve Cortese. Middle name?”

“I don’t have one, actually.”

“How do you not have a middle name?"

“I swear I don’t have one!” She laughs at the look from Jared that earns her and looks to Jensen for support. Jensen just raises his eyebrows and gives a sideways smile. He mentally kicks himself for being cold to this woman who has done _nothing_ wrong, but watching Jared interact with her like this is reinforcing every fear he’s been trying to suppress.

Her laugh is loud for someone so small and Jared grins at her in a way that makes Jensen’s stomach sink.

“OK, well, we’ll have to mark you down for lying.” Jared pretends to write something on her headshot and continues.

“Where are you from?”

“Idaho.”

“Why does this say you’re from California?”

Genevieve laughs. “OK, well, yeah, I’m originally from California but we moved to Idaho when I was a kid.” She rushes the explanation as Jared shakes his head pretending to write something else down.

“Wow, you really _are_ a liar!” Jared admonishes her while she laughs.

“That wasn’t a lie! I consider Idaho home.”

Jensen can’t help be charmed by her. She seems sweet, and she’s seems able to deal with Jared at his most hyperactive, which is a good sign. But he hates the way she’s smiling at Jared and even more the way she seems to be making him smile at her.

“OK, well what in your past has prepared you to play a demon? I mean, Iowa isn’t exactly – ”

“Idaho.”

“Sorry. Idaho. But either way. The Midwest isn’t exactly gritty enough for demons.

“Um, correct me if I’m wrong, but much of this show _takes place_ in the Midwest.” Her hair falls to one side as she cocks her head at him.

“I’ll be asking the questions here, Idaho.” Jared’s smiling gleefully, and Jensen is praying for Eric to walk in and end this. Deciding he can end whatever they’re doing is one thing; actually having to watch Jared flirt with this woman is another, and Jensen decides it’s just too much.

“Sorry, of course,” Genevieve coos with fake contrition and winks at Jensen, steadily refusing to stop trying to involve him in this despite his continued attempts at remaining aloof toward her. Genevieve looks thoughtful for a moment. “Well, I saw Rosemary’s Baby as a kid.”

“Your parents let you watch that movie when you were a kid?” Jared is incredulous, but he leans in like he genuinely cares about this detail of her life, and Jensen’s breath catches in his throat.   
  
“No. There was just this woman in my neighborhood named Rosemary who had a baby out of wedlock. My parents used her as a cautionary tale about the consequences of premarital sex, which they actually called “Satan’s path,” so…I’m pretty sure I _got_ this.”

Jensen gives a genuine laugh at that, and Genevieve looks pleased with herself for having gotten him to laugh, which endears her to him even more. After that, Jensen warms up, joining in the conversation and helping to calm Jared down some so he’s not quite as manic. By the time Eric comes in, Jensen has actually stopped focusing on how hard it could be to work with her and has to admit he likes her.

The read goes well – it actually goes really well – and when Eric invites Genevieve back for the individual read with Jared the next day, everyone seems to sense that it’s a formality.

As she’s gathering up her things, Eric suggests the guys should take Genevieve to dinner after they’re done for the day.

“Actually, I have plans.” Jensen ignores the look of surprise from Jared and rushes on. “But J – you take her.” He gives Jared a friendly clap on the back, but doesn’t make eye contact as he gives a small wave to the group and jogs out.

Jensen almost begs off the rest of filming – he could plead with Bob, claim to be sick, and just disappear. But both he and Jared loathed doing things like that – they don’t call in sick – they play with pain – and the thought of breaking that tradition for such a stupid reason just didn’t sit well with Jensen.

So instead he fumbles his way through pages of dialogue, which results in Bob not getting anything usable out of him until they get to the last scene of the day, which is an emotional scene between Sam and Dean.

“Man, can we talk about this scene for a second?” Jared asks cautiously. Since the reading, Jared has asked Jensen a couple of times if Jensen was OK, earning him a terse response to the first query and a an angry “stop fucking asking me that” in response to the second. He clearly hadn’t stopped wondering, but he had stopped asking.

“Sure,” Jensen says softly, hoping to sound more like himself than he feels.

“I just – I don’t get it. I guess, why Dean is so upset. I mean, Sam is trying to save him in the same way that Dean saved Sam.”  
  
“But Dean already made the sacrifice,” Jensen finds himself explaining passionately. “So Sam doing anything that might cost _his_ life would make Dean’s sacrifice pointless.”

“Dude, OK, but I just want to say on Sam’s behalf, Dean never _asked_ Sam if this is what he wanted. He just did this huge thing that impacted both of them without – ”

“He saved his life!” Jensen exclaims. This is a fight they’ve had on behalf of their characters before and the familiarity helps Jensen to calm down.

“But why would Dean think Sam would be more OK with _him_ dying than Dean is with _Sam_ dying? Sam doesn’t want to lose his brother anymore than Dean wants to lose his.”

“It’s different for the big brother.” Jensen says with finality. Jared rolls his eyes at that, but he seems appeased enough that they start in on the scene.

Except Dean is supposed to cry. So Jensen thinks for a minute at how hard this must be for Dean because of course Sam is right. Of course Dean _wants_ to live. But for him to have what he wants, Sam would have to die, and more than Dean wants anything for himself, he wants whatever Sam wants for _himself_. Even if that thing Sam wants will absolutely kill Dean.

And Jensen starts to cry. But he can’t stop. And Bob calls cut, and he walks away from the shot, but he’s still crying. Hard. And now Jared is there and he’s hugging him and Jensen is falling into Jared’s body and he’s dimly aware that people are around, but nothing about this moment feels romantic or sexual. It feels like solace. 

Shooting breaks for the day, and Jensen goes to his trailer to clean up. After finally getting his body to stop crying, he looks at his face in the mirror and suddenly he can’t stop laughing because the and Jared are having, essentially, the same fight as their characters. He can’t figure out if it means Sam and Dean’s relationship is fucked up or if his and Jared’s relationship is. 

Jared gives him about ten minutes to himself before barging in, and he catches Jensen leaning against the wall, laughing loudly.

“Dude,” Jared begins uncertainly. “What’s wrong with you today?”

“Nothing,” Jensen wheezes trying to stop himself from laughing. “Sorry, I was being a dick earlier. I’m fine. I think I’m just tired.”

“Well can you cancel whatever ‘plans’ you have tonight?” Jared uses air quotes and rolls his eyes. “What the hell was that? I know you don’t have plans.”

Jensen shrugs feeling delirious from having cried and laughed harder in the last thirty minutes than he has all week. “I thought I’d give you guys some alone time.”

“Me and Genevieve?”

“She’s hot.” Jensen gives a smile and a shrug. 

Jared’s not smiling. “Yeah? You want me to hook you up?” Jared’s eyes narrow. “Fuck you, Jensen.”

“Fuck you,” Jensen says back but with no animosity as though it’s more of a call and response. It takes him a minute to realize Jared is actually angry.

“No. _Fuck you_ , Jensen. What the hell is that? You’re – what – setting me up on dates now?”

“I’m – Jared – come on. You were flirting with her. I just thought I’d let you off the hook.”

“ _Let me off the hook_?” Jared looks angrier than Jensen has seen him look before, and it’s intimidating. “Jesus, Jen, I knew you were bad at this shit, but that’s seriously how you’re breaking up with me? Setting me up with a girl and telling me you’re _letting me off the hook_?” 

“Breaking up with you?” Jensen gives a short laugh at that, which was clearly the wrong move since it seems to make Jared angrier. “We’re not even – we’ve never talked about what the hell we’re doing Jared!” Jensen is shocked to hear his voice come out so loud. It’s still scratchy from crying earlier, but he’s definitely yelling.

“You’re the one who never wants to talk about it!” Jared is yelling too now, his eyes wide at the disbelief that this is being turned around on him. “You hold my hand and you sing to me on New Years. And then the stuff you were saying the other night about how you wouldn’t let me forget I belonged to you. And then you just shut down. _Again_!”

Jensen blinks and realizes he's missing a lot of this story, which makes him yell desperately, “Why the hell didn’t you say _any_ of this before?” 

“You never want to talk about it!” Jared repeats angrily.

“ _I never want to talk about anything_!” Jensen bellows so matter-of-factly Jared has to stop himself from laughing in spite of himself. “But you always get me to do it. You’re always the exception! You’re always my exception! Why did you think this time you wouldn’t be?” Jensen is out of breath and he’s not angry anymore. He’s tired. He’s confused. And he’s fighting with the only person who could make him feel better right now.

“How the hell was I supposed to know that?” Jared looks at Jensen with narrowed eyes.

“How the hell could you not have?” It’s cuter than Jensen wishes it were, but it’s the only answer he’s got. He looks at Jared for another second, and his face softens, but Jared’s doesn’t. Instead he walks out of Jensen’s trailer, and Jensen doesn’t follow.

Enveloped by silence where there had just been yelling, Jensen is startled by the stillness. He takes a deep breath and his mind starts to wander as he thinks back and starts to play memories in his head and lets them take on vastly different meanings.

It’s like the first time you pair the Dark Side of the Moon with the Wizard of Oz in the background and wonder _how didn't I see this before_  because Dorothy starts running right when he sings  _no one told you when to run_.

_Jared telling him to spend the night in his room the night of the going away party. Jared’s clenched jaw when Chad asked if Jensen wanted him to invite anyone in particular to New Years. Jared’s excitement at Jensen getting possessive of him that night._

Suddenly Chad’s drunken words made more sense than they did on New Years’ Eve: _If you guys are just fucking around, cool. But if you care about him, don’t – he’s single and then boom. He’s not._ Jensen feels his heart quicken when he realizes that maybe Jared hadn’t been single for quite some time. And then he thinks about every time he has thought something but didn’t say it, every time he assumed Jared wasn’t invested in this, and realizes that Jensen has likely been confusing and inadvertently hurting Jared for about that same length of time.

 Jensen walks to the door and pulls it open ready to go after Jared, but stops short as Genevieve stands in front of his trailer.

“Hey,” she begins uncertainly. “I was just gonna knock. Jared just headed out. He said he’d already had plans but that you wanted to have dinner with me? Of course I’d love to, Jensen. Thanks.”

Jensen blinks down at her. “Yeah, Genevieve. I’d love to. Just let me grab my stuff.” Jensen turns back into his trailer rolling his eyes at the turn of events and the knowledge that he wouldn't be getting to bed anytime soon even though he's exhausted, but he can’t help the smile forming. At least if Jared’s still fucking with him, he can’t be that pissed.

 


	11. Löwenbräu’s Not a Beer

They go to an Asian Latin fusion place nearby that Jensen has hated on principle since it opened, but Jared told Genevieve he'd already had the studio make the reservation. Jensen doubts the truth of this, but he doesn't know how to tell Genevieve that without inviting uncomfortable questions about why Jared is pissed enough to lie about something so stupid. Instead he resigns himself to a menu he imagines will consist of things like sashimi tacos, plantain fried rice, and a general culinary theory that consists of taking foods he actually likes and ruining them beyond the telling of it.

On the ride to the restaurant, Jensen leaves Genevieve to handle more than her fair share of the small talk, which he does genuinely feel guilty about. By the time they get to the restaurant and are seated, they've exhausted all the obvious topics, and Genevieve is clearly struggling to keep the conversation going.

“So, you know what I just realized?” she asks brightly looking up from her menu. “We kind of have the same name. Like, Jen –” she points at him, “and Gen.” She gestures to herself with a smile. “It’s kind of funny, right?” Off his look she groans and rolls her eyes. “So it sounded as dumb out loud as it did in my head? Yeah. Great. Good to know.”

Jensen gives a hearty laugh and she joins in. “Give me a break!” she exclaims. “I'm running on fumes here. I used up all my good small talk in the car. I'm trying, and you are not making this easy!”

“I'm sorry. I know. I just - I'm – today was long.” He finishes with a small smile.

“Yeah, are you OK? I stuck around to watch the rest of filming, and I saw you had a really tough time coming out of character. I hate when that happens.”

“Yeah,” Jensen replies hollowly. He opens his mouth to elaborate but realizes almost immediately there’s not a lot more he can say without giving away too much so he closes his mouth again.

“Use your words, Jensen.” Genevieve teases gently. “You can do this. It’s called a conversation.”

“It was an intense scene,” Jensen begins safely. “Because, I mean – ”

“You guys are fighting,” Genevieve volunteers.

“We’re – ” Jensen looks up flushed and frantic. “No! Not – we’re not, like, it’s fine. We’ll be fine.”

“On the show,” Genevieve supplies slowly looking at him curiously.

“Right,” Jensen deflates and mentally kicks himself for being so obvious, but Genevieve just smiles softly. “On the show.”

“That must be hard, then. Given how close you two are. It must be hard fighting with him. On the show.”

“Yeah,” Jensen begins to explain and when he does, he feels something inside him _breaking_ and he feels like if he doesn’t get all this out in a rush he’s going to start crying again. Because suddenly he has a strong desire to keep talking, to keep describing the tangle of emotions that have been swirling inside of him since early today and, when he really thinks about it, since earlier than that.

So he takes a big sip of wine and continues. “Because I feel so bad – Dean feels so bad. And I look at him – at Jared – and he’s the only one I want to see when I feel like this, but then he’s the reason I feel like this. And I’m supposed to be angry at him for being selfish and for not knowing that I’m only doing all of this to save him; that I’m letting myself die for him but really more than I’m angry it just hurts because. I can’t imagine having to lose him.”

“On the show.” Genevieve says again simply – kindly – and Jensen suspects it has more to do with giving him an out than with making a distinction she has any interest in at all.

“On the show.” Jensen agrees with a smile.

Their food chooses that moment to be ready, and they’re interrupted by huge plates and a fortunate distraction. After that, the conversation starts to feel easier, and it’s only partly due to them finishing the first bottle of wine and ordering a second. It’s not until Genevieve mentions visiting her brother in Chicago that Jensen gets quiet again. The story she tells reminds Jensen of the first time he and Jared traveled there for a convention and the pizza place they went to, and how they blew off the architecture tour to get drunk and then got lost on their way back to the hotel room.

He starts to tell the story, but then remembers his date with Danneel from months ago and decides that telling a story about Jared right now may not be a good idea.

He is so lost in thought that he doesn’t notice Genevieve has stopped talking and has fixed him with a curious stare.

“You do that a lot,” she observes. “It’s like you have a thought, but you overanalyze it, and I can practically see you playing the entire rest of the conversation out in your mind, and then you, like, decide you wouldn’t like where the fictitious conversation would end so you don’t let yourself say anything at all.”

Jensen startles at how frighteningly accurate that is and Genevieve continues.

“Yeah,” he admits. “That’s – yeah, that’s a really good description of how my mind works.”

“That makes me indescribably sad.”

“Why?” Jared blinks at her.

She shrugs and shakes her head. “I’m sorry. That sounded awful. I didn’t mean it like that.”

“What did you mean?”

“Nothing. Jensen. Really. Nothing.” Genevieve looks so desperate to change the subject that Jensen takes pity on her and drops it.

“Well, I was just going to tell you about the first time Jared and I went to Chicago,” he supplies instead.

“Ooh! Yes. Tell me.” Genevieve takes a sip of her wine and grins with what Jensen calculates is 6% genuine excitement over the story and 94% relief he was willing to change the subject.

The conversation doesn’t wane again, in large part because Jensen forces himself not to overthink what he wants to say to avoid giving Genevieve more reasons to give him that sweet but knowing smile he has been both grateful and resentful to be on the other end of.

“You guys are gonna be tough to work with,” Genevieve laughs after Jensen tells her about the massive prank they’d just played on Eric to celebrate the show getting renewed that involved having the impalas towed from set. She takes a beat and closes her eyes and opens them looking serious. “I mean, if I get – not that I’m necessarily going to – crap. I didn’t mean to sound so –” She gives a short laugh. “God, I’m the _worst_!”

Jensen laughs. “It’s fine. It was pretty obvious today you were the frontrunner. I won’t let the word get out that you’re an entitled princess.”

“Great, then I promise to keep _your_ secret that you’re a standoffish prick,” she grins into her wine glass as he sputters a response.

“Was I really that bad? I’m sorry – I really am. You caught me on a bad day.”

“I’m teasing, Jensen, it’s fine. _You’re_ fine. Truth be told, I decided I liked you before I decided I liked Jared.”

That earns a disbelieving look as Jensen cocks his head at her. “It’s true,” she continues. “Jared’s sweet, but he’s _a lot_. You’re just a lot more my speed. Plus, I liked you – in part – because watching you guys together made me like him more. There’s something about you guys together. He seems so manic and you seem so distant, but he can make you belly laugh from just a look and you can calm him down just by offering to buy him a beer.”

Jensen looks at her curiously at that and she explains. “When we were waiting for Eric and everyone today, I heard you say something about Löwenbräu, and he immediately just came down a notch. It was like magic.”

Jensen gives a big laugh at that and thinks back. He remembers deciding to help calm Jared down after Genevieve had impressed him, despite his best efforts at the time not to be impressed. But he hadn’t been paying attention enough to remember when he’d said “Löwenbräu,” though, now that Genevieve has mentioned it, he has no doubt he said it.

“Löwenbräu’s not a beer,” Jensen responds automatically. “Well, it is,” he quickly corrects himself off Genevieve’s look. “But that’s not what we mean when we say it.”

“Then what do you mean when you say it?” Genevieve asks.

“It’s just – we screw around a lot. We figured out we needed a way of signaling when we don’t want to joke about something or when we need the other one to get serious or if we need something to stay just between us and not get talked about in interviews. So if one of us says ‘Löwenbräu,’ that means ‘no more joking’ or ‘keep this a secret; or…anything we need it to really.”

“Why Löwenbräu?”

“We both really like it,” Jensen lies easily.

Jensen can’t reveal the real story of Löwenbräu, of course, because, well, that’s what Löwenbräu means.

**************************************************************************************************************************************************  
Jensen had been the one who taught Jared to drive stick, a fact, which, now given their relationship, has provided them with an endless amount of amusement.

There was a time, though, that the fact that he couldn’t drive stick couldn’t have been less funny to Jared and, in fact, had been a huge source of embarrassment that he’d only admitted to Jensen late one night during first season while they waited for a car to come pick them up from a dive bar outside of Vancouver. Learning to drive _means_ driving a manual transmission for Texas guys, and not having learned made Jared feel decidedly unmanly.

But Jared had moved to LA when he was young, and the car given to him by his parents, a 1969 Camaro, had an automatic transmission. It was the car he learned how to drive on and it would be the car to last him well until he’d been driving for a while, and at that point, it hadn’t been exactly convenient to learn.

So when he admitted it to Jensen that night, right before downing the rest of his drink as they sat watching the bartenders close up behind them, he’d flushed sheepishly, betraying what a huge confession he’d thought it was.

Jensen had nodded quietly and shrugged that it wasn’t that big of a deal because they never drove themselves anywhere anyway. But that weekend, he’d shown up early at Jared’s house in LA and offered to take him out and teach him to drive his truck.

They’d driven around North Hollywood, Jensen reasoning that it was both close by Jared’s place and that it would let him practice dealing with hills and inclines that would be the hardest part of learning.

They spent the better part of a day finding random errands to run and allowing Jared to practice. Jensen showed no end of patience, reminding Jared again and again as the car stalled that he needed to keep the gas and clutch even and grinning happily whenever Jared got it right.

They stopped by a boutique liquor store because Jensen had needed to stock his bar and Jared had sworn by this place. When they went in, Jensen yelped when he saw that this placed carried Löwenbräu - real Löwenbräu as opposed to the crap knock-off version Anheuser-Busch had started manufacturing, which had prompted the brewers to pull the real stuff off the shelves in the U.S.

Jensen insisted on buying four six-packs and sliding it in on the bench in front in between him and Jared as they started home. Everything was fine until Jared went to find parking a few blocks from his house in an effort to show off to Jensen that he could park on a hill. But as soon as Jared tried to park, the truck began rolling backwards.

Jared panicked, and in a move he still can’t completely justify, picked up the beer – two six packs at a time – and began throwing it out the window like he was baling out a sinking boat.

Jensen was dumbfounded for a good twenty seconds before his mind was able to process what Jared was doing and just how stunningly stupid it was.

“Jared – _J_ – stop! What the hell are you doing, man?”

“We’re rolling backwards!” Jared exclaimed by way of explanation as if it was possible Jensen had not realized that yet.

“Put the – stop chucking the beer! Put the car in first! What are you – ” Jensen had reached over and shifted the car and put his hands on Jared’s to calm him down.

They stared at each other for one moment of shocked silence before they began laughing hysterically, doubling over, barely able to breathe.

“What the _fuck_ was that?” Jensen asked incredulously when he caught his breath.

“I don’t know, dude! We were rolling backwards! I thought if – ”

“You thought the secret to driving stick was throwing beer out the window?”

“I thought maybe it was weighing us down!” They’d begun laughing hysterically again.

“If weight was the problem, why the hell would you start with the lightest thing – we weigh more than the beer, Jared!”

“Did you want me to throw us out?” Jared asked throwing his hands up.

“Oh, you’re never hearing the end of this. I’m telling this story at Paleyfest, dude.”

Suddenly all laughter was gone from his voice and Jared’s eyes had gone wide as he’d shaken his head frantically. “Please, Jen,” he’d begged. “But for real. Don’t.” His voice had gotten quiet. “I don’t want anyone else to know I can’t drive stick.”

Jensen had immediately held his hands up in surrender. “First of all, you _can_ drive stick now,” Jensen had pointed out with a grin, relaxing only when Jared gave a small smile back at that. “But don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone about the Löwenbräu.”

And just like that, they had a safeword.

“Löwenbräu” became the word they whispered to each other after all their most embarrassing moments. When Jensen had gotten so drunk the night before he was still drunk the next morning and threw up on Jared while he was spotting him lifting weights, he said it to Jared as he apologized through the bathroom door while Jared showered. When Jensen had walked in on Jared crying because he was tired and homesick, Jared barely got the word out through hiccups and tears as Jensen just sat quietly next to him letting him sob and then letting him talk about Texas and his family for the rest of the night. When Jared freaked out and called Jensen from a girl’s bathroom because the girl had asked if Jared was into watersports and Jared didn’t know what that meant, the call had ended with a hurried whisper of “fuck. Löwenbräu. And come pick me up _now_.”

It became pre-emptive. When they went to a party where they knew that Chad or Tom or Chad and Tom would talk them into getting stoned, they promised anything either of them did while high would “go on the Löwenbräu list.” They declared a “Löwenbräu shield” around the bar where Jared had his 24th birthday party.

But the most frequent uses came on set. Jensen had become incredibly skilled at not breaking when Jared messed with him during their scenes, but every once in a while it was too much to take and Jensen really wanted to nail his coverage, or one of them had to get off set at a reasonable time, or they’d just had a hard day and couldn’t deal with the constant screwing around. On those days, one of them would simply say, “Löwenbräu” and the other would give him what he needed.

That’s what it means. More than _no more joking_ or _keep this a secret_ ; more than _this never happened_ or w _hat happens here stays here_. Löwenbräu is their code word that means _I trust you to know me_.

After Jensen’s brief explanation to Genevieve he swallows hard, thinking about how hurt Jared must have been over the past few months that Jensen has been so unable – and what probably seems unwilling – to live up to their simply agreement to just know. _I wonder how many times he’s been trying to say Löwenbräu to me_ , Jensen wonders sadly.

“What did you mean?” Jensen says suddenly with a sly smile.

“Hmm?” Genevieve looks up from her salad.

“What you said? About it making you sad? The way my mind works. What did you mean?”

“Jensen really – ”

“What did you mean, Genevieve?”

Genevieve lets out a small sigh and cocks her head to the side, letting her hair fall perfectly around one side of her face. “I meant – I imagine you’re always like that. Not just overthinking the things you let yourself say but the things you let yourself do. Playing them through to the conclusion you think is most likely and determining whether to let yourself proceed based on how it all unfolds in your head. And that’s – that makes me sad. Because it seems hard. Because – ” She stops for a moment like she’s choosing the next words incredibly carefully. “Because he’s not like that. And that has to be painful for you both.”

Jensen’s mouth goes completely dry and he reaches for his water but comes up with his wine. He honestly doesn’t think he can choke out a single word, so he still drains the glass before he lets himself speak. It turns out it didn’t matter because all that comes out is, “uh.”

“It’s – Jensen. It’s fine. You guys are – you’re careful. I’m just really attuned to these things. I – my brother is gay so – whereas some people might see you and think ‘codependent best friends with boundary issues’ I think…something else.”

“We’re – we’re still.” Jensen scrubs his hand across his mouth because he doesn’t know what to say and he doesn’t feel like lying and he’d actually really like to talk about it. So he just sighs, “You’re right. Jared is the exact opposite. He just rushes in without thinking so – ”

Genevieve shakes her head frantically. “No, actually. That’s not what I meant. He doesn’t rush in without thinking. He – ” She exhales looking at a loss for words before she continues. “He’s not your opposite. He’s your inverse. He overthinks too it’s just – he rushes in _because_ he thinks about it.”

“How do you – ”

“Well, I think about how you both treated me. He embraced me immediately. You were much more reserved – ”

“I believe the term you used earlier was “a standoffish prick.”

“Exactly. Thank you.” Genevieve grins. “So opposing reactions, right? But based on the exact same assumption – I was going to be your new costar.”

Jensen blinks slowly considering this. He thinks about what Jared had been trying to tell him about the scene they’d worked on that day. It’s not that Sam didn’t understand Dean’s sacrifice. He’d completely understood it. And they were fighting because Sam wanted to do the exact same thing for Dean. They reacted differently, but they had the same underlying motivation – they would each do anything for their brother. Then Jensen about their fight. Jared was pissed because Jensen tried to let him off the hook because he’d assumed they were dating, and Jensen was terrified Jared wasn’t taking this as seriously as he was because…he’d assumed they were dating. He thought he and Jared had had a misunderstanding. But…they didn’t. Not really. They actually had the same understanding and just hadn’t realized they had been on the same page. And when he thinks about it, he could laugh because _of course_ they were thinking the same thing. Because, really, when weren’t they?

“You’re scared.” Genevieve doesn’t bother making it a question. Jensen’s head is spinning and he tries to make sense of the fear bubbling up inside of him.

“I – we’re not just – I think – I think I may be in love with him.” He whispers it and doesn’t look at Genevieve right away.

When she responds he can practically hear the smile in her voice that forces his head up to meet her eyes. “You work together, live together, and even when you have time to yourselves, you look for opportunities spend it with each other. And now you're actually concerned because you think you might be in love with him?"  
Jensen shakes his head with a small smile. Maybe he's worrying over nothing. “You don't think I should be concerned?”

“I think you should be concerned you're only just now figuring it out.” Genevieve grins and looks down. The network had called ahead to take care of their bill, and she reaches out for the small tray showing it had been paid and pushes it toward Jensen. “Here. Do you want your fortune cookie?”

“Nah, I’m good.” Jensen smiles. “I need to head home. I’ll call you a car too?”

“Thanks Jensen.” Genevieve smiles and stands up. “I think this conversation will lead to something fruitful for all involved.”

Jensen looks back at her with a bewildered expression and she grins. “That’s what my fortune cookie said.”

Jensen throws his head back to laugh at that as they walk out of the restaurant together.


	12. The Purple One

When Jensen walks in, Jared is coming in from the gym in the garage, sweating and shirtless. Jensen lets his eyes trail over Jared’s body, enjoying the view, before schooling his face into what he hopes is a mix of serious and contrite.

“You’re working out late,” Jensen observes letting his eyes meet Jared’s for a moment and is rewarded with stony eyes and silence.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Jared says simply as he walks past Jensen into the bathroom to grab a towel to wipe off his torso. Jensen follows him and watches his face in the mirror.

“Want me to - I was gonna do a load tonight if you want me to throw that in?” It's desperate and barely believable. Jensen looks like the walking dead, and the mere thought that he planned on staying up another hour and a half to do laundry (even without Jared’s knowledge that Jensen doesn’t actually _need_ to do laundry) is laughable. But Jared doesn't laugh. Instead he drops the towel on the floor with the faintest shake of his head.

“I brought back my leftovers.” Jensen says thinking he’s playing his trump card. This time he’s rewarded with a wary and guarded gaze toward the kitchen, and Jensen stifles a laugh at how much Jared looks like a wounded, sulky puppy being offered a treat to distract him and despite knowing it’s a ruse, can’t help but sniff the air in case it’s something good.

“I thought that place would suck,” Jared says evenly.

“Oh, it did,” Jensen responds.

Wrinkling his nose, Jared looks incredulous. “Then why did you bring me back your leftovers?”

Jensen shrugs. “Because I always bring you back my leftovers.”

Jared doesn’t respond to that. Instead he walks into the kitchen and pointedly ignores the takeout container on the counter, grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge.

Jensen watches him take a long pull from the bottle and silently curses himself for not having begun this conversation with an apology like he’d planned. He doesn’t know what stops him in those moments when he knows what he _wants_ to say but can’t force his mouth to cooperate, but whatever it is, he hates it right now because he _wants_ to fix it.

“You’re not gonna be able to sleep now,” Jensen tries again. “You never can sleep right after you work out.” Then, even though he’s certain it won’t work, he gives a wolfish smile and says, “I’ll have to wear you out.”

Jared’s glare in response to that is what breaks Jensen. He’s going for angry. He’s _clearly_ going for angry. But instead of icy or withering, Jared looks…sad. He narrows his eyes but they’re watery and red from fatigue and emotional exhaustion. His face radiates more hurt than it does scathing, and when he clenches his jaw, it looks more like an attempt to bite back tears than anything else. Without realizing he’s doing it, Jensen is on Jared in a flash, pulling him into his arms and melting at the realization that Jared is letting himself be pulled.

“Jared, fuck, I’m sorry. I’m _so_ , _so_ , sorry.” He runs his hands along Jared’s sides, up his back, through his hair. “J – I shouldn’t have – of _course_ I didn’t want you to go out with – you’re my – _please_ forgive me.”

He gives up on words and turns to pleas as he presses his lips against Jared anywhere he feels skin. Kissing his neck, his chest, his arms. Jared leans in, letting his body fall heavily against Jensen. Jensen takes that as a cue and begins to unbutton Jared’s pants, but at that, Jared pulls back in a huff.

“Jensen – just – _no._ ” Jared tenses up and straightens up again and glares at Jensen, still looking more tired and lost than angry. “We’re not just doing this like you always do. We’re not using sex to – I want to _talk_ about this.”

Jensen looks taken aback. “I don’t use sex. I mean, I don’t use – ”

“I want to _talk_.”

“Yeah, no, Jared, whatever you want. We’ll talk.” Jensen gestures to the couch. “I can talk.”

Jared walks to the couch and flops down and Jensen sits beside him. He reaches out to run Jared’s knee, which Jared allows and Jensen grins.

“So what do you want to talk about?” Jensen asks with a smile.

“Eh,” Jared replies, smiling for the first time that night and Jensen’s heart actually skips a beat at the sight. “Whatever.”

Jensen chuckles and then closes his eyes. He wills the part of himself that always chickens out in these moments to just _shut up_ and takes a deep breath.

 “I really am sorry,” Jensen begins cautiously. “For today and for – _God_ – I guess for a long time. I – I never meant to make you feel like…well, like I did.”

Jared just gives a short nod, so Jensen continues.

“Obviously, I didn’t _want_ you to go out with Genevieve – who is cool as _hell_ by the way – but I just figured you wanted to, and I’d –”

“Let me off the hook.” Jared finishes rolling his eyes. “Jen. Seriously. What did you think we were doing? I mean, I know we didn’t talk about it, but, did you really think we were just – fucking?”

“I – I honestly don’t know what I thought.” Jensen feels his face burning because the way Jared says it, it’s like he’s struck by how idiotic his assumption had been. _Of course_ it wasn’t just sex. It couldn’t have been. They’d spent all their time together before and –

“Jensen!” Jared snaps, pulling Jensen from his thoughts. “You’re supposed to be talking to me, and I can practically hear you thinking instead of talking. So for once in your life get out of your head and say stuff. And also, for once in your life, make it be stuff to make me less pissed at you?”

Jensen snorts a laugh at the admonishment. “OK. Deal. Everything I’m thinking, I’m saying.” Jared gives a small nod so Jensen continues. “I was just thinking – I’m an idiot. Of course we weren’t just fucking and when you say it like that… _of course_ it wasn’t just that. It’s just…” Jensen trails off and looks pensive.

“Jensen,” Jared says warningly.

“It’s like the Matrix.”

The inside joke makes Jared laugh. The hours they have spent debating The Matrix are things of legend. Every aspect of the movie – the million different metaphors and interpretations, whether Keanu Reeves was right for the part, whether the sequels were just bad or the worst thing ever, whether it could be true, whether it _is_ true…the topics could span a lifetime.

And they’ve addressed them all, it seems, so many times they’ve lost count, Some nights kicked back at bars, but even more, perfectly sober, afternoon debates, days on set, articles emailed back and forth, early Sunday mornings when sleepiness hasn’t quite worn off yet and the only thing there is energy for are things that have been done a thousand times over.

“How the hell is this like the Matrix?”

“Because I’d take the blue one.” Jensen says it simply knowing it would need no explanation because they’ve talked about it before. Jared swears he would have taken the red pill and seen the truth. But Jensen has always firmly held that he would have taken the blue one, gone back to sleep, and kept living. If he was happy in the world, he’d reasoned, what did it matter if it wasn’t real?

“So, my not talking about it? About us? It was me…I don’t know. Trying to take the blue one. Like, I thought if we didn’t name it, if we didn’t talk about it, then…OK, I couldn’t know for sure that it was real, but I also couldn’t find out for sure that it _wasn’t_ real.”

“That is the first thing you’ve ever said about the Matrix that makes sense.” Jared smiles and Jensen, spurred by the ice slowly melting, grabs his hand.

“But the blue one doesn’t exist for us. Not really. Because whatever this is between us – even when we were just friends – it’s…I _know_ it’s _something_. We’ve always been _something_. So, not talking about it…it may not have been the red one, but it wasn’t really the blue one either. It was…the purple one. And that’s what screwed us up. There wasn’t supposed to be a purple one.

Jared’s eyes soften completely and for the first time that night, he looks to Jensen like himself.

“I get that.” Jared says simply. “I – that actually makes sense.”

“I’m so _sorry_.” Jensen lets it out in one breath it feels like he’s been holding for a long time. 

“I know.”

“J – why didn’t you – what I said earlier? I hate how I said it, but it was true. You know I would have talked about it if you’d wanted to. Why didn’t you make me do this any sooner?”

Jared shrugs. “You knew if you asked me, I wouldn’t have flirted with Genevieve. Why didn’t you just ask me not to?”

When Jensen doesn’t respond to this, Jared continues. “I want to give you what I think you want just as much as you want to give me what you think I want.” And then he shakes his head and gives a small smile. “Sam doesn't want to lose his brother anymore than Dean wants to lose his.”

Jensen rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling, “yeah, yeah. I – yeah. I get it.”

Jared looks up, his eyes glinting and meets Jensen’s eyes. He looks less tired suddenly. “So what do you want to do now?” There’s hope in his voice, and Jensen finally feels his whole body relax with the realization that he hasn’t blown it. Even so, he leans in and whispers when his mouth is write next to Jared’s ear.

“I want to keep talking.”

Jared looks surprised as a small smile plays across his lips.

“I’m going to talk to you tonight,” Jensen continues, his voice low. He thinks back to their first night and is struck by the urge to kick himself when he realizes that Jared had told him in that night exactly what he needed, and honestly it hadn’t changed. “Because today sucked. And we almost lost – ” he gestures between them - “we almost lost this. And you couldn’t sleep because you’re nervous. And hearing my voice will make you less nervous.”

Jensen knows he’s said the right think when Jared looks at him like he’s exactly what he always wanted and lets himself be led into Jensen’s bedroom.

Jensen pulls down Jared’s sweatpants and lays Jared down on the bed in just his under. He pulls his own shirt over his head, pulls down his pants and climbs into bed in boxer briefs. “Roll over,” he whispers roughly in Jared’s ear.

Jared complies and rolls over on his stomach. Jensen sits over him, straddling him as he’s done so many times he’s lost count and begins to rub Jared’s back.

“Did I ever tell you about the first time I came thinking about you?” Jared whimpers at the words and Jensen continues talking, letting his voice stay low, rough and soft. He continues rubbing Jared’s back as he speaks.

“It was after I’d given you a massage once. You had pushed yourself too hard in the gym like you always did, and I noticed I’d started letting you do because – well, first because you have a fucking unbelievable body, and it doesn’t suck to watch you. Speaking of, I was kind of jealous you worked out tonight when I was gone. But the other reason I liked when you worked out to hard was that I got to bring you in here and rub your back.”

Jared’s body had relaxed at this point, and Jensen focused on working the tension from his muscles, a day of stress and anger and fear culminating with a hard work out left his muscles strummed tight, and even as his emotional stress bled out of his body, it left in its place knotted muscles aching to be soothed.

“And you’d moan while I did it and make these fucking noises that I swear you were doing on purpose to turn me on because…they did. They _really_ did, J. And I’d get so hard while I was straddling you, fantasizing about what I really wanted to be doing while I was above you like this, and then as soon as you’d leave to go upstairs I’d jack off where you’d been laying.”

“Jensen,” Jared whines and rolls over. He looks up at Jensen and Jensen can feel that he’s hard beneath him. “Fuck, I didn’t know you – ”

“Yeah, Jared. Every time. I’d be so hard _every time_.” He grinds his hips down, pushing his erection against Jared’s. “I’d be _this_ hard. Every. Time.” He leans in and claims Jared’s mouth in a fierce kiss and they allow themselves to buck up against each other.

Jensen continues kissing Jared and pulling away to continue to whisper in his ear. “I’d come thinking about this. About turning you over and grinding against you until we both came. There was something so hot about the idea of coming without fucking, without even really touching. Like, we’d both just be so turned on we couldn’t help ourselves.”

“Fuck, Jensen, yes,” Jared panted into Jensen’s mouth, whining desperately every time they rubbed together, his cock getting harder than Jensen had felt him before. “Let’s – whatever you want – let’s come like this. Like you always wanted. I want – ”

“I’ve wanted a lot of stuff with you, Jared.” Jensen whispers softly and slows their hips as Jared gasps and whimpers trying to get the friction and rhythm back.

“Like, there have been times you’ve gotten hard at work. From – dude, I don’t even know what. But I’ve noticed you half hard in your jeans and wanted to – ” Jensen lets out a shaky breath realizing how much he’s talking and feeling knee-jerk discomfort, but also feeling emboldened by Jared’s reaction to it. When he looks down at Jared, sweaty, and writhing, his hair stuck to his forehead, looking up at him with eyes that beg Jensen to keep talking.

“I wanted to pull you aside, not even back to our trailers, just, like pull you around a corner where no one could see us but anyone could walk up at any minute and tell you I was going to take care of you. Like I always do. That it’s no different than when you’re sweating and I wipe your face. That I’m going to make you come all over my hand because you _need_ it. And I’m gonna take care of you.”

Jared’s hips buck up at that and Jensen pushes his hand into Jared’s boxer briefs, not pulling them down, just grabbing Jared and beginning to stroke as Jared lets out a low moan.

“Fuck, Jensen.” Jensen’s hand is moving quickly, smearing the length of Jared’s cock with precome and Jared allows himself to fuck into Jensen’s hand in rhythm with Jensen’s stroking, getting lost in his words.

“And I’d put my hand down your pants, and jerk you off, just like this, _fuck_ , and tell you how you have to come fast because anyone could see us, and they’d see you begging for me to get you off in the middle of filming, and know how bad you need it.”

Jensen slows his hand as Jared groans in half arousal and half frustration, but that frustration disappears quickly as he feels Jensen pull Jared’s underwear down and move down his body.

“And then there was the first time I tasted you.” Jared _moans_ at that, wantonly, and he looks embarrassed for just a moment before he sees Jensen grinning at him.

“I remember – you had gone down on me first. In L.A. The morning after our first time. And I wanted to do it too, but I was nervous and you had done _such a good job_.” Jensen licks his lips staring at Jared’s cock while beneath him Jared has started to sound like he is close to tears.

“And so it was before the party, when I was dressed like Dean and you were still in a towel. I kept staring at you. In the towel, knowing you were naked and probably hard underneath it and…it was…I was just _really_ conscious of the fact that it was your cock that was turning me on. The idea that underneath that towel was…you. And you were hard, and I wanted to taste you.”

“You were fucking incredible that night, Jen.” Jared grasped his hands on the sheets and held tight, willing himself to not buck up while Jensen’s face was right next to his cock.

“I didn’t know what to do, but I remember I got on my knees for you and I licked you right…here.” Jensen sticks out his tongue and licks the tip of Jared’s cock where he is leaking and Jared, despite his best efforts, lets his hips stutter up, hissing “fuck” as Jensen takes the precome into his mouth.

“And then I kind of – lost my mind for you because I couldn’t believe how you tasted.” With that, Jensen begins sucking Jared in earnest licking the underside of his cock, running his tongue just below the head, using the tricks he knew would bring Jared close, but not letting him over the edge.

Jensen pulls off again to speak, continuing to stroke Jared with his hand. “You tasted familiar, and I couldn’t remember what it was like before I’d ever sucked your cock, back when I didn’t know exactly what you tasted like. It was like when we became friends, and I couldn’t remember a time before we were. That’s when I knew. And I should have said it then, J. Of course I knew. That’s when I knew – ”

“That we weren’t just fucking.” Jared finishes for him between pants.

“That I love you,” Jensen corrects him. Jensen looks up seriously at Jared and repeats it just in case it wasn’t clear. “I love you.” There’s a second of silence and Jensen chooses that moment to flick his wrist _just right_ and Jared involuntarily moans and comes on Jensen’s face.

Jensen keeps stroking Jared through his orgasm, shocked at the turn of events. Jared recovers first.

“Fuck, Jen, I’m _so_ sorry!” Jared reaches for Jensen’s face helplessly, realizing when he makes contact he actually has no idea what he’s trying to do. “Do you want me to get a – ”

“It’s fine.” Jensen says with a shrug. “It’s really – it’s not a big deal, I’ll just clean it up.” Jensen bites back a feeling of overwhelming embarrassment that he’d picked such an inopportune time to say “I love you” because now this distraction had pulled them from the moment and Jared hadn’t gotten a chance to respond.

When Jensen stands up to go get a towel, he feels a strong hand pull him back down. He looks down to see Jared staring at him intently.

“Jensen, me too. I – I love you, too.”

“Are you just saying that because you came on my face?”

“No, don’t trust it if I say it _before_ I come on your face,” Jared says with a laugh. He keeps Jensen’s hand and pulls him back down into the bed. Once Jensen is lying down again, Jared rolls over, stands up, and strides to the bathroom to grab a towel. He returns it and tosses it to Jensen, lying down next to him.

“Jen – thanks for tonight. I know this doesn’t come naturally for you. So thank you.”

“Yeah,” Jensen responds softly.

“And fuck, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to come _there,_ and I also didn’t mean to come yet. I – if you want to – we can still.” Jared turns to look at Jensen curiously. “Wait. I have another question. Why have _you_ never wanted to fuck _me_?”

“I – it’s not that I didn’t want to. I just. I didn’t know what I was doing. And I was scared of hurting you or – I don’t know.”

“But I didn’t know what I was doing either,” Jared reminds him. Jensen nods.

“Yeah. But if we’ve learned anything from tonight, it’s that I was more scared of me hurting you then I was about you hurting me.”

“OK, so then, what about now?”

Jensen pitches his voice low again and moves into Jared’s body. “You want me to fuck you, J?”

“Fuck, _yes_.” Jared mouths against Jensen’s neck, but as he does so, he catches a glimpse at the clock and can’t believe it’s almost 2:00 am.

Jensen follows Jared’s eyes and kisses him softly. “Dude, we have an early call time.”

Jared shakes his head. “But I want – ”

“How about this? Tomorrow? I’ll buy you dinner?”

Jared smiles softly. “Anywhere I want?”

“Anywhere you want.” Jensen promises.

Jared grins giddily in a way that makes Jensen wrap his arms around him in happiness. “OK,” Jared agrees with a silly laugh. “And since you’re buying dinner, I’ll put out.”

Jensen laughs heartily and pulls Jared into a spooning position. “That sounds perfect.”

Jared moves into Jensen’s body, only remembering then that Jensen still hadn’t come. Despite Jensen’s insistence that he’s fine, Jared quickly lowers himself and sucks Jensen off in record time, letting Jensen come in his mouth and pulling off with a sigh and a grin. They curl up together and let sleep slowly take them over. Their last murmurs of the night come out in whispers.

“You better not pick that fucking fusion place,” Jensen threatens with a smile.

“I’m eating your leftovers for breakfast,” Jared responds.


	13. The National Society for the Foundation of I Sensed Homoerotic Tension on Television and People Almost Died

When Jensen wakes up, he has a moment where he doesn’t remember the details of the previous night. So when he reaches out instinctively to pull Jared close to him, he is rewarded not just with the flush of warmth from Jared’s body but with the memory of everything that transpired the night before that fills him with a warmth that radiates from the inside out.

And when he exhales, he feels like he’s letting go of a breath he hadn’t been aware he’d been holding.

“Morning.” He says as Jared opens sleepy eyes to fix him with a happy gaze.

“Morning, Jen,” Jared responds, his voice rough from sleep.

Jensen brushes a kiss to Jared’s temple. Jared grins widely and then as if remembering something stiffens and pulls away.

“Fuck, I’m gross, dude. I should have showered last night after working out.” Jared starts to roll out of bed, but Jensen pulls him back, shushing him gently and pressing a quick kiss to his lips.

“Just – come here another second?” Jensen pulls him close and Jared relents, rolling over and letting Jensen continue to spoon him for another few minutes. Jensen begins tracing the muscles along Jared’s back, letting his fingers dip low, right above the curve of his ass and then continuing along his hip bone and gripping his hips right beneath the waistband of his underwear.

Jared instinctively bucks back into Jensen when he feels Jensen’s hand tighten along his hips, feeling where Jensen is half hard on account of it being morning.

“Jen – I really have to shower if you want – ”

“Shh. Don’t want anything. Just this. Just let me – ” Jensen murmurs against Jared’s shoulder, continuing to trace lines up and down his body in a way that isn’t sexual, but is certainly sensual.

“What’s your deal?” Jared asks, and even though he’s facing away from Jensen, Jensen knows he’s smiling because he can practically hear it.

“What deal?”

Jared hums noncommittally, allowing Jensen to continue tracing patterns along his body. After a few more minutes of this, Jared insists on a shower, rolling over to kiss Jensen lightly and heading upstairs to his bathroom.

Jensen allows him a few moments of token solitude before he finds himself walking into Jared’s bathroom, calling loudly to be heard over the sound of the shower.

Jared pokes his head out and stares curiously at Jensen. “What’s up?” he asks confused before schooling his face into a sly smile. “Wanna get in?”  
  
Jensen hesitates for a moment, considering it before forcing himself to shake his head when he realizes that would catapult them from “normal late” to “people are gonna be pissed.”

Jared shrugs and sticks his head back in the shower, continuing to yell back to Jensen. “What’s up then?”

“So, where do you want to go tonight? For our – date?” Jensen lets himself smile happily to himself, silently admitting how excited he is to finally be able to call a dinner out with Jared a date.

Jared gives a hearty laugh and pokes his head back out. “I don’t know. Is there any reason I have to tell you now? Like, before I wash my hair?”

“You can have as much time as you want. Just give me enough notice to make a reservation.”

Jared shrugs. “I’m sure the show can get us a reservation if it’s – ”

“No, but _I_ want to make it, Jared,” Jensen rolls his eyes as if he’s saying something that should be obvious to Jared. Jared just nods and pulls his head back in the shower.

“Let’s do Hy’s?” he calls back out.

“Perfect,” Jensen responds pulling out his phone. As an afterthought, he pulls the shower curtain back and splashes Jared with a handful of the running shower spray. “And hurry up, you’re gonna make us late.”

Jared laughs and swats back at Jensen but misses as Jensen angles his body away and walks out chuckling to himself.

He makes the reservation online quickly while he absentmindedly wanders into the kitchen and begins pulling out his leftovers from the night before. He rolls his eyes as he remembers the bizarre combination of chicken breast topped with kimchi and orange sauce – what he had considered the least offending item on the menu – and heats it up on a plate alongside the inexplicable side of tortillas that had been served with it.

He pulls it out once it’s warm and places it on a tray, along with the guava juice Jared had started buying the week before and had become obsessed with. Knowing he’ll have more than once glass, he brings the entire jar and a glass filled with a lot of ice.

He’s carrying it into Jared’s room when he hears the shower turn off. Jensen sets the tray on Jared’s bed just before Jared walks in – wet but wearing a towel around his waist – grinning.

“What are you – ” he stops short when he sees the tray and grins up at Jensen. “What is this?”  
  
“You said you were gonna have my leftovers this morning.” Jensen responds, almost defensively, and as the words come out of his mouth he feels his face flushing and is suddenly embarrassed, though he can’t figure out why.

“Yeah, but I figured I’d just grab it out of the fridge on my way to the car. What is all this?” Jared is smiling but looks genuinely perplexed, making Jensen’s face burn hotter.

“I just thought this would be easier,” Jensen mumbles, but it’s too late because now Jared is staring at him in disbelief.

“You – is this you being…are you trying to be _romantic_?” Jared asks incredulously as if he’s putting together the pieces of their morning so far and throws his head back laughing, not unkindly, but Jensen still feels his stomach clench.

Jensen feels his body deflate. This – putting himself out there in an undeniably _I want to date you_ kind of way and having Jared see it as over-the-top – had been one of the things he had been avoiding when he was still avoiding things. He feels himself start to shut down, but doesn’t get the chance to because Jared only continues to laugh happily until he notices Jensen’s tight jaw and cloudy gaze.

Jensen glances down at the floor and refuses to let his eyes meet Jared’s. Just like that Jared stops laughing and moves toward Jensen quickly.

Wrapping him up in a tight bear hug that Jensen tries and fails to stay tense through, Jared runs his hands up and down Jensen’s back. “Hey – shit, Jen, I’m sorry. I wasn’t laughing at – this is so nice of you, thank you.”

Jared’s breath tickles his neck, and Jensen feels warm all over even as he continues to try to look upset.

“I mean, everything this morning has been – you’ve been amazing, Jensen.” Jared pulls Jensen in even closer and leans his head down so he talks right into Jensen’s ear, kissing softly at his neck and he drops his voice to a whisper. “You keeping me in bed just to be close to me? That was _really_ nice. I wish I could have stayed next to you longer. And the fact that you made the reservation tonight yourself instead of staffing it out or whatever was _very_ cool. Did we get one?” When he feels Jensen nod against his chest Jared squeezes tighter. “Sweet. Thank you. I can’t wait.”

When Jared pulls back, Jensen looks relaxed again, and when Jared fixes him with a stare and Jensen doesn’t roll his eyes or duck out of it, Jared is satisfied he’s been forgiven.

He gives a smile and continues. “The _only_ reason I laughed – the _only_ reason – is that –”

“You’re an asshole?” Jensen supplies with a laugh, earning a chuckle from Jared. “I mean, here I’m trying to make our first date special and – ”

“See that? That’s the reason I laughed. Jensen, tonight’s not our first date. Nothing actually changed last night, Jen, besides you admitting you can be a dick.” He smiles and continues. “But – dude – I’ve been dating you since _Halloween_.”

Jensen furrows his brow trying to think of a comeback, but his shoulders slump when he realizes he doesn’t have one. Jared is _right_ , and in response Jensen drops his head and shrugs his shoulders almost shyly.

Jared cocks an eyebrow and looks at him. “Why do you want it to be our first date?”

Jensen starts to shrug again, but instead he takes a breath and looks up at Jared. “Because I thought it’d be my chance to – I don’t know – redeem myself. Like, I could prove to you that I’m, you know, in. I’m in this. I’m all in. And I can be – I don’t know – romantic and everything.”

Jared beams at that and Jensen knows he said the right thing. “You don’t need to redeem yourself, Jen. Besides. _This_ is the beauty of dating your best friend. I already know you. When you say you’re in, I believe you. You don’t have to prove anything to me.”

Jared moves back toward Jensen, leaning in close and letting his lips graze across Jensen’s ear. Jensen closes his eyes and swallows as Jared whispers, “plus, as far as romance goes? I know you. So I already _know_ how bad you are being romantic.” Jared starts laughing before he gets the last part out, and Jensen shoves him playfully.

“I’m bad at being romantic?” Jensen laughs gesturing to the tray of food still sitting on Jared’s bed.

“Yeah, but you didn’t tell me what you were doing!” Jared gives a belly laugh. “Your strategy – from best I can tell – was to prove to me that you can be romantic without me noticing!

Jensen finds himself laughing harder at that, and when he and Jared lock eyes, uproarious laughter morphs into huge smiles while they continue just staring at each other.

After a moment, Jared interrupts the gaze and speaks. “Well, how about this? I’m more romantic                                you.”

Jensen smirks at Jared, rising to the challenge. “I’m totally more romantic than you. Dude, I give you backrubs.”

  
“I let you steal my clothes.” 

“I buy you candy whenever I go out.”

“I buy you Greek yogurt whenever I go grocery shopping.”

“I sang to you on New Years’.” 

“I don’t try to fix you up with girls.” Jared says pointedly and raises his eyebrows at Jensen with a smile.

“I brought you back my leftovers.” Jensen shrugs sheepishly and gestures to the tray.

“ _Yeah_ you did.” Jared picks up the entire chicken breast and bites into it like it’s a potato chip, licking his fingers as sauce runs down his hand. He grins at Jensen and keeps his eyes trained on him as he continues. “But I still win. I’m more romantic than you are. Wanna know why?” 

Jared leans in conspiratorially like he’s about to let Jensen in on a secret. “’Cause I’m gonna let tonight be our first date.”

Jensen can’t help the smile that spreads across his face at that. “This isn’t over,” Jensen warns as he walks downstairs to the bathroom, realizing he needs to get moving or Jared will – for the first time since they started the show – be ready before he is.

Jared isn’t ready before Jensen. 

An hour later, Jensen is sitting in the car joking with Clif about his wife’s new insistence that they take ballroom dance classes while they wait for Jared. When Jared finally comes loping out of the house, without the dogs who are with the dog-sitter today, Jensen grins and watches him walk out.

They don’t run lines in the car today. Instead, the three of them make happy small talk about it being Friday and the fact that it’s supposed to be a light shooting day and they have dinner plans that night. At some point, Jensen reaches over and takes Jared’s hand, careful to hold it down, out of Clif’s line of sight from the rearview mirror, and they stay like that for the rest of the ride, Jensen soflty stroking Jared’s wrist with his fingers. When they arrive on set, Jensen turns to Jared and smirks. “See? I’m totally more romantic.”

The game doesn’t end there. When Jared beats Jensen to the hair and makeup trailer, Jensen resigns himself to getting his makeup done first. It’s an old competition for them – they both would always rather get their hair done first, so every morning is a race to see who will get to the trailer first. Today, however, Jared volunteers to get his makeup done first, letting Jensen take his turn for hair. They make eye contact in the mirror and Jared gives a smug smile, pointing at himself and giving a shrug, countering Jensen’s earlier declaration with a silent rejoinder of _no, I’m totally more romantic_.

They continue the game of oneupsmanship throughout shooting. Jensen anticipates Jared’s crafts services needs all day – which, truthfully, isn’t that difficult to do because it really only consists of bringing him a water bottle every couple of hours and food – a lot of food – anytime he walks near craft services. Jared makes a point of opening the Impala door for Jensen when they have a scene to shoot in the car. Jensen plays the guitar for Jared in their trailers between takes. Jared carries Jensen’s coat all day, as the warm Vancouver spring sun makes it untenable to walk around in their usual three layers between takes.

At some point, they forget that they’re competing and, instead, just fall into a comfortable rhythm that allows them to be even more attentive to each other than usual while filming.

Whenever Jensen has to reach up to dab Jared’s brow when he sweats, he also fixes his hair, letting his fingers run deliberately through his hair and then linger on his forehead. Jared changes his blocking so that instead of sitting next to Dean during a research scene, Sam stands behind him, and quickly rubs his shoulders as Dean reads about the demon they’re after this episode.

They both take turns waiting until no one is paying attention to them, busily setting up another shot or huddling over production decisions, before paying each other whispered compliments and blushing when the other says something particularly flattering or anything that can be taken more than one way.

Jared becomes particularly distracted during one scene where Sam and Dean are sitting on a motel room bed because he notices there’s a thread coming unraveling from Jensen’s sleeve. 

“Here, let me – ” Jared pulls the thread with a pop and smiles at Jensen, who meets his eyes and smiles widely back.

“Thanks. Is my cuff – ”

“Here, I got it,” Jared says without taking his eyes off Jensen’s, he fixes the cuff on Jensen’s shirt, his tongue swiping his lower lip subconsciously as his fingers brush Jensen’s wrist. Jared’s face breaks into a huge grin. “What would you do without me?”

“I honestly don’t know,” Jensen responds softly.

They keep their eyes on each other for another minute before Jensen remembers where they are. 

“Hey!” Jensen calls out to where Phil and the production team seem to just be staring at them. Eric is on set today, and Jensen thinks maybe they all just got caught up in some conversation about the shot. “Are you gonna call action, or what, Phil?”

“I did call action! You two idiots just didn’t start _acting_! What the hell are you doing?”

“I was fixing Jensen’s shirt!” Jared calls out, stifling a laugh as they both realize that they had just been holding up the scene to flirt with each other.

“Oh thank god because that stray thread would have seriously compromised the aesthetic integrity of the shot.” Phil responds dryly.

“I’ll compromise _your_ aesthetic integrity!” Jared calls back laughingly.

The rest of the team has a good laugh at that, and it takes a minute to quiet everyone down again. “Well, only if Jared is done dressing Jensen on whatever the fuck, I’d love to continue,” Phil calls rolling his eyes.

Jared flips him off, as they continue setting up the shot. Jared stretches and flops back on the bed, causing his shirt to ride up some, while Jensen stares at the strip of skin that is now exposed.

“Alright!” Phil calls, pulling Jensen’s eyes away from Jared’s stomach to his face. Jared catches Jensen’s eyes dart up and gives him a knowing smile. Jensen looks down shyly and then back up at Jared, and they it there staring at each other again, smiling softly as if no one else is on set at all.

All of a sudden Jensen realizes there _are_ other people on set and they’re all being suspiciously quiet. Jensen looks over at Phil and chuckles, hoping they haven’t been too obvious and tested the limits of their luck that no one seems to notice anything different between them. “We’re waiting for you to call action!”

“He did call action!” The rest of the crew bellows and Jensen and Jared both laugh loudly. 

Phil gives up. “That’s lunch!”

*******************************************************************************************************************************

The day wears on. A number of production crises have transformed what was supposed to be a relatively easy shooting day into one that is already going long by the time they come back from lunch.

Jensen calls and pushes their reservation back an hour, and they ratchet up the flirting as a way of making up for lost time on their date. They’re filming yet another episode full of emotional scenes between the brothers, so they take advantage of the opportunity to be close and pass it off as brother bonding.

Jensen keeps his hand on Jared’s knee during an entire “I have to take care of you, Sammy” speech. Not to be outdone, Jared slips his hand up the back of Jensen’s shirt as Sam carries an injured Dean out of yet another warehouse.

They sit so close to each other during scenes the lighting actually has to be changed because producers are concerned the scenes actually look like the guys are about to have sex. They gaze longingly at each other while delivering lines, and once, when Sam gets up from the bar table to go to the bathroom, Jensen lets his eyes follow him and clearly checks out his ass as he walks by.

It’s during the same bar scene when Jared makes the interesting acting choice that instead of ordering his own beer, Sam should simply grab Dean’s and have a drink, and they should hand the glass back and forth between each other throughout the scene, that Phil calls cut. He and Eric talk for a minute, Eric watches playback and then comes walking over to the guys, giving a small, slightly embarrassed smile.

“Hey, fellas, look, it’s fine to play with it like you always do, but you’re laying the Wincest on a little thick in this episode.” Eric gives a chuckle and Jensen and Jared glance at each other guiltily. “It’s fine,” he rushes on quickly. “Just tone it down, yeah? I don’t want to spend the whole week this airs dealing with phone calls from the National Society for the Foundation of I Sensed Homoerotic Tension on Television and People Almost Died.”

“No problem, Krip,” Jared says easily, eyes dancing with a desire to laugh.

As soon as Eric is out of earshot, Jensen turns to Jared incredulously. “Dude. Do you usually do that?”

“What?”

“Like he said? Do you usually – play up Wincest like he said?”

Jared snorts out a laugh. “No!”

“Then…is Wincest…dude, is it _our_ fault?” Jensen asks realization dawning on him. “Is it because – ”

“Because you’ve always wanted me?” Jared raises his voice here, taking comfort in the fact that the two of them teasing each other about one having a crush on the other won’t actually raise suspicion. “Jensen has always wanted me!” Jared yells to anyone in earshot. “He’s finally willing to admit it!”

“No you’ve always wanted _me_.” Jensen kicks Jared under the bar stools they’re both sitting on. They gently let their feet continue to rub together each other as they talk.

“We should have a poll. The CW should, like, sponsor a poll to see who people think is more in love with whom?" 

Jensen snorted out a laugh. “Do you – how the hell do you think the CW would make that happen?”

“I don’t know. They could, like, film us on set. Film you flirting with me, and then ask people to vote online.” 

“You really want them to see how you just stare at me all the time?” Jensen’s eyes glint teasingly. “See how you’re always looking for excuses to touch me?”

“They’ll see how much you _want_ me to touch you.”

“Yeah?” Jensen runs his foot across Jared’s calf and Jared grins.

“Yeah.” Jared responds, and they are caught up in another moment where they just lock eyes and smile. This time it only lasts a few seconds, though, when Jensen turns to Phil.

“We’re waiting for you to call action!”

The crew responds without missing a beat. “ _He did_!”

“Back to one!” Phil calls out. He rolls his eyes, but he’s laughing.


	14. Their Version of a Happy Ending

When Eric jogs up to them apologetically, Jensen has to bite his tongue to keep from losing his temper. 

Jensen prides himself on being a patient guy. The long hours, the chaotic schedules, get old sometimes – _really_ old. And he knows other actors turn into prima donnas about days like this, when shooting runs way over schedule. He knows guys – and even _likes_ some guys – who have been known to yell at crew or producers for plans having to be canceled, or even just walk off set.

He and Jared definitely get frustrated sometimes when the show takes over any semblance of outside life they have, but they keep that frustration between the two of them for the most part, choosing to vent behind closed doors to each other and keeping a smile on their faces in front of everyone else. After all, they are the ones being the most-well compensated for working those long and often crappy hours, so if the crew can pull it together to make in a year what they made for an episode, they’ve always figured they could suck it up.

Besides, Supernatural is beyond generous with them. If flights ever have to be cancelled or postponed because of filming, the show pays for the change without a problem. They’re quick to offer dinners to make up for any inconvenience, and had even offered to pay for Jensen to stay in a hotel for three months back when he’d lost his apartment and knew his busy schedule wouldn’t have afforded him time to find a new one. 

And if they ever have really important plans, the team will do anything in their power to make sure they don’t have to get cancelled. Which is why Jensen is so frustrated tonight. Because it’s 11:00 pm. And he’s pushed their reservation back twice now. And he has a date that he is looking forward to more than any date he’s ever had. But he can’t tell anyone that because as far as they’re concerned, he’s just having dinner with Jared, which seems like the easiest plans in the world to cancel.

So when Eric comes jogging up to them with that _can I just get thirty minutes, fellas_ look in his eyes, Jensen has to stop himself from losing it.

Eric must sense his frustration because he starts out apologizing. “Fuck, guys, I’m sorry. We were supposed to have you out of here two hours ago. I just – I really need to talk to you and it has to happen tonight because you guys are getting new pages tomorrow, and I want to explain what’s going on.” He rushes on before either of them have a chance to protest. “I don’t know if you still feel like going out, but, hey why not, it’s Friday, right? And obviously, the show would be happy to buy you guys a couple of steaks – ”

Jensen feels his body deflate and tries to force himself not to be disappointed. _It doesn’t actually matter if I buy him dinner tonight_ , Jensen reminds himself. He tries hard not to think of that day years ago in the back of an SUV when Jared dreamily talked about someone buying him dinner and tries even harder not to think about the fact that maybe he’s been waiting to take Jared on this date since he heard that.

“Actually,” Jared breaks in smoothly. “Jensen’s already buying me dinner.” Jared grins at Jensen, and all the tension bleeds out of his body with the realization that _of course_ Jared gets that this matters to him. He’s actually embarrassed for having doubted Jared even for a second. Of course Jared gets it. Silently, Jensen admits defeat. Because Jared is definitely more romantic than he is.

“Fair enough,” Eric responds. “I will keep this as short as humanly possible.”

They follow Eric into the trailer he uses as an office when he’s on set and sit down. Jensen notices Eric looks at Jared first, and seems kind of grim.

“Is it Gen?” Jensen guesses once they’ve settled, and Eric looks confused for a second before shaking his head no.

“What? No, Gen’s great, and ready to go. She’ll be on set when we get back from hiatus. It’s, um – it’s just a storyline, Jared, I know you’d been looking forward to.”

Jared cocks his head and Eric continues. “The strike fucked everything up, man. And we’ve been trying to sneak it in – figure out a way to shorten the arc and get Sam to a place where he can be the one to rescue Dean from Hell, but we can’t do it.”

Jared slumps a little, and Jensen looks immediately protective. Jared has been telling anyone who will listen that he wants to see Sam do this.

Jensen has always appreciated that neither of them jockey for exciting storylines or more screen time for the sake of it. But they are protective of their characters and sometimes will ask for things to be explored for the sake of fleshing out the character and his motivations. Jensen had asked for more scenes with Jeff because he wanted to explore Dean’s relationship with his father, and he would have gotten them had Jeff’s career not taken off so spectacularly and so inconveniently.

Jared’s only request had been this. He wanted Sam to be the one to save Dean. Jared often joked about how Sam was the worse brother, but there was definitely a degree to which he believed it. He understood that they had to set up a dichotomy where Dean had followed their father and Sam had rebelled, but he feared they left the audience taking too much on belief that Sam’s complicated feelings about his family didn’t stop him from loving Dean as much as Dean loved Sam. He wanted Sam to do something that undeniably showed that if given the opportunity, Sam would lay down his life for Dean as quickly as Dean did for Sam. 

“Well, can we – I mean, can we do it early in fourth season?” Jared asks.

Eric shakes his head. “I’m sorry, man. We’re going to start setting up the new storyline. We need – next season we’re going with a broader theme. There will still be monster of the week episodes, but we’re setting up a more epic, good versus evil battle. So, what we’re going to do will open things up a little more. Make it less claustrophobic. So while Sam is exploring things with Ruby, Dean is going to be getting integrated into this larger battle. And, so, that’s how we’re going to get Dean out of Hell. It’ll be the way he meets a new character we’re bringing on.”

Jensen and Jared exchange a glance. Eric rushes on. “I’m not explaining it well. The new character is – I can’t give you all the details. But it’s this guy who becomes really close to Dean.”

“Is it – is he going to be closer to Dean than Sam is? Is it like – ” Jared actually looks hurt and Jensen wants more than anything to wrap him up in a hug.

Eric shakes his head sharply. “ _No_. Never. This show – it’s always going to be the two of them. I actually think this will really help Sam’s arc. It’ll give some more build up for what we have planned in the future, and I think, having him feel like he couldn’t save his brother will be really good. We want him feeling like he needs to atone.”

“Eric, listen, obviously, whatever you decide is what we do, you know I’m not trying to pull any…whatever. But. Isn’t there something we can do? I don’t want Sam – I don’t want it to be, like, one more time Sam couldn’t be there for Dean.”

“Jared, you _know_ this writers’ room. It won’t be like that. I give you my word. You and I see Sam the same way. That _will_ be reflected in how we handle this, I swear.”

Jared gives a small nod and a small smile, and Eric looks relieved. Jensen, however, isn’t convinced.

“Alright, let me get you out of here,” Jensen says with a smile at Jared. “Thanks Krip.” He pats Eric on the shoulder while ushering Jared out of the trailer. They walk in silence until they get back to their trailers. Without saying word, they both slip into Jared’s. Jensen quietly sits on the couch while Jared paces for a few minutes, opening his mouth to speak and then closing it again. Jensen says nothing, waiting for Jared to talk.

“It’s not like – I mean, dude. It’s gonna be fine, right? Whatever the story is. It’ll work?” Jared rubs his palms together anxiously.

“Of course it is,” Jensen returns easily. “But you’re still allowed to be upset.”

“I just – I’m not. I – this is so stupid. This is seriously not even a big deal!” Jared shakes his head with a wry smile. Then he looks at Jensen a little wide-eyed. “And you know – dude, you know, this isn’t like me wanting Sam to be, like, a badass or something, right. It’s not like that – ”

“Jared, come on, of course I know that.”

“It’s just – ” Jared stops and flops down next to Jensen on the couch. Jensen looks at him patiently, aware that Jared is finally ready to talk about what’s bothering him. But Jared surprises Jensen by just turning to him and asking softly, “can we go?”

Off Jensen’s look, Jared starts to explain. “It’s just so late already, and I know you really wanted to take me out tonight. I just want to get out of here before I’m too exhausted to even go. Is that cool?”

“Of course, we can, J.” Jensen shrugs and stands up. “Did you want to shower?”

Jensen follows Jared’s eyes as he glances longingly at the shower but shakes his head slowly. “We don’t have time – " 

“We have time for anything you want,” Jensen insists. “I’ll call the restaurant. Go take a shower, get dressed, and meet me in my trailer?”

Jared leans in and kisses Jensen gratefully and begins pulling off his shirt immediately. “I’ll be so quick,” Jared promises.

When Jared walks into Jensen’s trailer an impressively quick fifteen minutes later, his hair is wet, prompting Jensen to pull him into a kiss as soon as the door is closed.

“Not that I’m not enjoying this,” Jared says roughly as Jensen pulls away from the kiss to trail his lips up Jared’s neck. “But we really should go. I think we’re testing the limits of the restaurant’s last seating policy.”

“I already took care of it,” Jensen murmurs against Jared’s skin, continuing the exploration of his neck.

“How?”

“We’re picking up take-out and eating on our living room floor.”

Jensen pulls back for a second and watches as Jared’s eyes light up, telling him everything he needs to know about what Jared would actually prefer to do tonight, before Jared schools his face into a more neutral expression.   
  
“No! Jensen! You’ve been looking forward to this all day.”

“I’ve been looking forward to buying you dinner all day,” Jensen explains softly. “I don’t care where we do it. And I think you could use a night at home tonight.”

“But it’s our first date. We can’t have it on our living room floor,” Jared protests in spite of himself.   
  
“Why not?” Jensen pulls back from where he’s been kissing Jared’s neck (and starting to work a bruise there that he’s hoping Jared won’t notice later). “Seriously. Why can’t we?”  
  
Jared shrugs helplessly, clearly trying to avoid looking as relieved as he feels at the possibility of not having to go out tonight. “Because it’s not special.”

Jensen smiles when he thinks of his response. He pulls Jared close and leans up to whisper in his ear. “Nowhere special? I always wanted to go there.”

Jared gives him that smile – all teeth and dimples – and kisses him softly before whispering, “You were right, you know? You’re totally more romantic than I am.”

******************************************************************************************************************************

An hour later, they’ve just polished off a bottle of wine and are stuffed.

They lounge on the floor among the remains of their makeshift picnic, groaning contentedly and savoring the wine that Jensen had brought back from a Napa trip last summer.

Jensen is newly convinced that the best way – hell the _only_ way – to eat a steak is medium rare, sliced thin, dipped in brandy green peppercorn sauce, and fed from Jared’s fingers.

Now that the food has been demolished, Jared lets the dogs out of the other room. They sniff the air excitedly and cast sidelong glances in his direction, silently chastising him for holding out on them. When Jared slips into the kitchen to grab two tumblers of scotch when they decide to switch drinks, Jensen takes the opportunity to give each of the dogs a piece of steak he had squirreled away for them. They lick their lips and his hands gratefully, but manage not to sell him out to Jared.

They sit next to each other on the couch, Jared’s long legs stretched out on the table in front of them. They sip their drinks in silence until Jensen grabs his legs and pulls them across his lap.

The movement startles Jared who looks over at him and grins.

“The first night we kissed? You put your legs on my lap like this.” Jensen explains, which makes Jared laugh.

“You tryin’ to work up the nerve to kiss me, Jen?” Jared drawls with a smile.

 “No, I’m trying to get you to tell me what’s bugging you so much about the Dean-breaks-out-of-Hell storyline.”

Jared takes another drink and shrugs. “It’s nothing.”

“Well, it’s clearly something, because in the going on four seasons I’ve been doing this show with you, I’ve never known you to ever have a problem with a storyline.”

Jared looks up mortified. “Fuck, was I – oh, God, I was awful to Eric, wasn’t I? Shit. I don’t wanna be that guy, Jen.”

Jensen moved in closer so he can pull Jared into a hug. Jared lets himself fall into Jensen, and they stay like that a minute while Jensen quiets Jared down.

“Shh. You weren’t, J. You weren’t at _all_. You were great. He had no idea it’s still bothering you. I only knew because I always know when you’re not OK with something.”

Jared looks up at Jensen and gives a weak smile. “I didn’t want to be an asshole.”

“You weren’t,” Jensen promises.

“I just – I really wanted Sam to save Dean. I wanted to – I don’t know. It’s just – I don’t know how many more seasons we’re gonna get. And this was – you and I talked about this before – they have to die. When the show ends, Sam and Dean are gonna have to die. So this was their chance for – I don’t know. It was their version of a happy ending. Dean saving Sam, and then Sam could save Dean. I just wanted that for them. They always have more questions than answers, and I just wanted them to have that little bit of certainty. I wanted them each to have that as proof. That they would do anything for the other one. Does that – I’m not saying this right. Does that make sense?”

“It makes sense.” Jensen says solemnly. And he gets it.

Because Jensen doesn’t know how many more seasons they’ll get either. And they also have more questions between them than answers.

They haven’t talked about coming out, or even what coming out would look like because he’s not sure either of them identify as gay. They haven’t talked about parents or the network or the impact on careers.

They haven’t talked about friends or Clif or how much longer they think they’ll be able to hide it on set. Or how much longer they’ll want to.

They’ll have a new co-star, and maybe he’ll be as cool as Gen, but maybe he won’t be. And neither of them is stupid, and they’re capable of reading between the lines. They know the value of bringing in another male co-star is to capitalize on some of the excitement the show has generated from close relationships between male characters without the complications of a sibling relationship, and Jensen fears that may force a dynamic that may tap into some jealousy for Jared.

They can’t know what was coming next for them anymore than Sam and Dean can, and it makes Jensen understand – on a visceral level – Jared’s desire for Sam and Dean to have _some_ sense of certainty.

“I think Dean knows that Sam would do anything for him,” Jensen says slowly.

“But how?” Jared asks with genuine curiosity.

“Because – it’s like what you said to me earlier. About how I don’t have to prove anything to you because you know me? Well, it’s gotta be the same with them. Dean knows Sam is all in. He doesn’t need to prove it.”

Jared looks thoughtful for a moment and then his face spreads into a huge smile. “Dude does it ever bother you how much we have in common with them?”

“Daily,” Jensen responds without missing a beat. “It bothers me daily.” 

They finish their drinks and make two more, conversation moving from the show, to some on-set gossip, and speculation about the newest character and the storyline he’ll bring. Jared is convinced it’ll be related to their childhood, and speculates that they’re somehow going to bring Mary Winchester back. Jensen is convinced the storyline is going to pit the brothers against each other, and that maybe Dean was going to somehow bring Azazel back with him from Hell.

Then conversation gets lazier, and Jensen is rubbing his hand on Jared’s belly just slightly under his shirt. And it’s late, but tomorrow begins the weekend, so they don’t rush to get into bed. Instead, Jensen lets his hand slide further up Jared’s shirt. Jared sucks in a breath as Jensen continues moving his hand up to brush Jared’s nipple.

“So you did pay for dinner,” Jared begins with a sly smile. “And I promised last night if you paid, I’d put out.”

Jensen hums in agreement, but doesn’t move. He watches Jared with soft, questioning eyes. “Are you sure you want to?”

“Yeah,” Jared insists quickly as he licks his lips anxiously. “I mean, if you do. You don’t have to. Do you want to?”

Jensen rolls his eyes. “Yes, Jared. I want to fuck you. _Of course_ I want to fuck you. I just want to make sure you’re up for it.”

“I am. I just – I’m nervous.”

The magic words immediately take hold of Jensen. He leans in and kisses Jared softly. “What do you need? You need me to talk to you? Like the first time?”

Jared whimpers at the memory even as Jensen cringes at it. That first time Jensen had been so worried about whether Jared was enjoying himself, most of his talking had consisted of repeatedly asking things like, “J, tell me if this feels OK?”; “are you sure this is working for you?”; and, the one the one that had made Jared crack up in the middle of their first time together and had eased a lot of tension, “um, was that a good noise? Or an _I want to stop noise_? Because we can stop anytime you want and watch SNL.”

Jensen feels much bolder now and he nips and sucks at Jared’s throat as he talks low and rough in Jared’s ear. “You don’t have to be nervous because I’ve got you. Why don’t you go wait for me in your room while I get – supplies.” He kisses Jared again and watches as Jared stands up, stretches, and walks toward his room. When Jensen joins him a few minutes later, Jared is lying on the bed with his shirt off.

Jensen walks to the bed and pulls off his shirt as well. He lies down and begins kissing Jared, deepening the kiss but not escalating until he feels Jared’s body relax. When he pulls of Jared’s pants he feels him tense up again.

“It’s fine. I’m not going to do anything until you want it. And I’m gonna get you ready first. Remember how much I loved it when you fingered me the first time?”

“Fuck,” Jared sighs at the memory, and bucks his hips up into Jensen’s.

“That’s what I’m going to do to you. I’m going to do it really slow, and it’s going to feel so good, Jared, I promise.”

They stay like that for a while, slowly shedding more articles of clothing, kissing while Jensen makes whispered promises to Jared.

When Jared is panting and spreading his legs, Jensen finally lubes up one finger and presses it against Jared’s entrance.

“You ready?” Jensen asks roughly. “You gonna let me in?” When Jared nods frantically, Jensen begins to push his finger in slowly, whispering in Jared’s ear as he does. “Does this feel good? You feel so amazing, Jared, fuck. Tell me if you need me to slow down, OK? Just tell me.” Jared breathes out and lets Jensen work his finger in and out and before long he’s asking Jensen to add a second one.

“Fuck,” Jared pants out. “It’s – it feels good but it’s too – am I too tight?”  
  
“You’re fucking perfect,” Jensen responds without thinking. “You’re fine, J, I’ll make sure you’re ready before we do any more.”

“No, but I mean, you’re – fuck, Jen, you’re big. I mean, you’re thick. I don’t think you’ll fit even – ”

Jared’s eyes are closed, but he can hear the eye roll in Jensen’s voice. “J, if you fit inside me, I’ll fit inside you.”

Jensen puts his hands on Jared’s chest and Jared opens his eyes to look at Jensen. He looks serious. “But even if I don’t fit? OK. Then we stop, OK? It’s fine. All I wanted was to know what you felt like and now I do. Jared, you feel really fucking good. If you want to stop, we stop.”

“And watch SNL?” Jared finishes with a smile and a gasp as Jensen moves his fingers and Jared rolls his hips in response and he feels an _almost too_ intense burst of pleasure.

“And watch SNL,” Jensen agrees with a smile.

They don’t stop. Instead Jensen continues fingering Jared, and Jared continues getting more comfortable with it. Jensen begins jerking Jared off to the same rhythm he’s using to fuck him with his fingers, and after less time than Jared is proud to admit, he has to stop Jensen for fear of coming too quickly.

“Jen, I’m ready,” Jared says softly. “I really want you.” And Jensen remembers their first time again because that had been the same thing Jared had said that night. Jensen had been on top of Jared, and he’d been anxious and a little drunk, but when Jared whispered “I really want you” suddenly, all he felt was desire to lower himself onto Jared’s cock and make him moan.

It works the same way tonight. When Jared whispers those words, Jensen is on him in a flash, whispering in his ear, and slipping a condom onto himself. Jensen applies a generous amount of lube, holds Jared open, and begins to slide in.

He goes almost tortuously slowly, a move he’d learned from Jared that first night and at the time hadn’t appreciated it as much as he does now. It allows Jared time to adjust to each inch, minimizing the discomfort, and allows him to check in with Jared’s reactions. He remembers how Jared had studied his face, and he finds himself doing the same thing to him.

The slightest grimace prompts him to stop and wait, even as Jared bucks impatiently and urges him to keep going. Jensen kisses his neck and makes him wait until his body relaxes before he’ll push in further.

Jensen thinks back to their first time, of him lowering himself down, Jared’s huge on his hips guiding him controlling the pacing and slowing him down when Jensen tried to rush it.

He remembers looking at Jared’s face. His expression had been one of concentration, wanting to make sure he wasn’t hurting Jensen, but also something else. Something more sentimental. Trying to signal something that Jensen maybe hadn’t been looking for at that time.

When Jared had finally lowered him all the way down, Jared smiled up at Jensen and had told him softly. “I’m in.” At the time, Jensen had just taken it as an indication that he could begin experimentally riding Jared, moving slowly, grinding against him, pulling the most exquisite sounds of arousal out of him.

But now, as he is the one entering Jared, that night takes on new meaning in so many different ways, but most especially here, as he replays that simple declaration over and over again in his mind, with every inch he pushes himself into Jared, he thinks about it again.

Eventually, Jensen pushes in the rest of the way. Jared gives an experimental roll of his hips, and whimpers softly at the feel. Panting, Jared looks up at him. “Are you in?” He asks so softly Jensen almost misses it. But he doesn’t.

“I’m all in,” Jensen responds, and it sounds like a promise.

The End


End file.
